


A Few Figs from Thistles

by tzigane, Zaganthi (Caffiends)



Category: DCU - Comicverse, Smallville
Genre: Alternate Universe, Drama, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-06
Updated: 2011-11-06
Packaged: 2017-10-25 18:06:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 87,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/273211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tzigane/pseuds/tzigane, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caffiends/pseuds/Zaganthi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was no shock that Lex Luthor created clones, that he'd been working on the technology for years and years. He'd created Kon-El out of wholesale slivers of DNA, so his brilliance wasn't in question. Lex's motives were always in question though, never mind that if he'd worked for good he could've surpassed Einstein in the field of science, rather than modeling himself after Oppenheimer's darkest days.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Few Figs from Thistles

**Author's Note:**

> This is non-canon compliant. Basically, we took the parts we liked best from each different thing and used it the way we wanted. We had a ball, and that's what's important.

I am not willing you should go  
Into the earth, where Helen went;  
She is awake by now, I know.  
Where Cleopatra's anklets rust  
You will not lie with my consent;  
and Sappho is a roving dust;  
Cressid could love again; Dido,  
rotted in state, is restless still:  
You leave me much against my will.  
To S.M., A Few Figs From Thistles, Edna St. Vincent Millay

 

Gotham City.

Most visitors agreed there was something about it. They rarely agreed on just what that was. Some were fonder of Metropolis's open skies and gleaming towers, San Francisco's suspension bridge and bright California sunshine. Gotham wasn't for everybody, and Bruce Wayne had been aware of that all of his life. Aware of it, and trying to fix it, one way or another. By any means necessary, if he wanted to be honest about it, and he usually was. There wasn't a lot of point in lying to himself, even if he lied to other people in looks and word and deed.

It was his city, his home. He tried to fix it all, but it just wasn't possible. There was no way to tamp down on all of it, but there were things that concerned him. LeXCorp always concerned him, whether it was a warehouse, a facility or a lab, especially now that he owned all of it. This was a lab that hadn't been on any of his property lists. The name was discretely enough Perrault Labs, and the importance of it had perked on his radar when Luthor himself had entered the city limits.

Since the rise and fall of his presidency, Luthor had mostly been in hiding. Things had gone downhill for him in a hurry, and he'd managed to slip through Batman's fingers. Through Superman's, too, but Clark had always had a strange blind spot when it came to Luthor; he either let things go on too long or pulled him up too short, and it was clear that he hadn't spent any time at Excelsior. He must have had a terrible relationship with horses as well, just at a guess.

No sense of when the best timing was.

This, this was the best timing, and he was prepared, ready for whatever he might find when he broke down the lab door, caught Luthor red-handed, present on the scene of whatever criminality was going on rather than giving him the out of not knowing. That was the sort of timing Clark needed to learn. Maybe one day he'd figure that out, and Batman tapped his communicator. "Going in."

 _~There's a red bird flying your way as backup.~_ Just in case, Oracle didn't say, and his mouth compressed grimly for just a second. He wasn't going to need it, but it never hurt to have help standing in the wing, so to speak.

"I'll be done by the time he gets here. Out."

He might, _might_ , need Red Robin to help him secure any captures, but the work would be done long before he arrived. There was another moment of waiting, watching through his NOD, before he started forward. Luthor had entered, but then things had been uncomfortably quiet. Silence was a worse thing than noise when it came to Alexander Joseph Luthor. It had been when he was a kid and it was now, a sign that things were going deeply, horribly wrong, and that there would be an explosion at any moment. He just hoped that it wouldn't be the kind of cataclysmic blast that generally followed when it came to Lex.

Batman took a running leap and launched himself onto the roof of the lab, rolling to lessen the impact and the sound. It was good and solid, the architecture helping to prevent his movements revealing he was there. The closer he got, the longer the silence lasted, the more that a strange sense of dread tangled in him somewhere. Twenty seconds of fiddling with a latch on a high window got him inside, and he slipped quietly through a room full of stored scientific equipment and towards a door with light spilling in around it. Light and a very unpleasant sort of smell, one he recognized.

He started towards the light, stopped, checked the bodies just inside the door. Dead was never good, and he followed his first instinct, brought up the air filter in case they'd been gassed. There were too many criminals in Gotham who dabbled in aerosol poisons for his comfort. There was another body, and two more in the next room, women. Luthor's bodyguards, down and out for the count. One looked like her neck was snapped, and the other was bleeding from her nose and mouth, blonde brows knit tightly, one shaking hand reaching. Reaching, and he had never thought it would end like this.

Lex looked terrible, stretched thin in a way that had nothing to do with death and everything to do with sickness. He had the look of a man who'd been to the edge with chemotherapy, radiation, and he'd seen them fail. If he hadn't died violently in Perrault Labs, he'd have died in another few days, weeks at most.

The soft sound of a faint footfall made him turn quickly only to find Red Robin crouched on the stairs, watching through the mirrored lenses of his visor. "Oracle. We need medical assistance stat. Looks like the entire lab is dead or mostly dead. Don't know if any of them can be saved."

"They're gone." Luthor included. He'd never thought he'd see Lex dead like that despite everything. The man seemed to have a knack for rebounding from all circumstances, and had since he was a child, since before the meteors had fallen. "Stay here."

"Don't you want to know which direction the truck took?" Tim was, on occasion, scary good. He was also something of a smartass if he ever caught Bruce missing something. "I came from the other direction. Saw a white delivery truck heading up Vonne Street. Figure they're probably going to catch the interstate with whatever they've got loaded."

"....les." A whisper of sound, and then the woman convulsed faintly, choking on blood. "les."

Bruce grimaced, kneeling down beside her. "I'm sorry." His bodyguards were ever present, quietly in the background, and he was almost used to them. "Stay here with them, and I'm going after the truck."

Going and gone, leaving Tim behind to provide whatever medical care he could before the EMTs got there.

He had to know what was in that truck.

* * *

  
Most days, he didn't believe Luthor was as audacious and outrageous as he was, and then Bruce caught himself, remembered that Lex Luthor _was_ audacious, and always had been, though the unhinged insanity of it had mounted over the years. Built on itself, until the lines between acceptability and taboo had slowly blurred into nothing. There were a lot of grounds for it, or maybe not that so much as possibilities for reasons. Lionel Luthor would be enough to drive anybody insane, and that stay in Belle Reve clearly couldn't have helped.

For that matter, being at ground zero during the Smallville meteor shower couldn't have been good for anybody.

There were certainly days when he was suspicious of Superman, and days when he'd wondered if Krypton hadn't exploded for a good reason. Overall, Kent did more good than harm in the world. Saved more lives than his missteps cost, his rashness. If he'd been reading the files as Bruce was just then, he could only imagine the response. Explosive was probably the kindest suggestion. He'd probably start ripping the world apart trying to find the contents of that van, and Bruce didn't think he'd be careful about it. The thing was that mind-numbingly conscientious was exactly what they would need to be if what he thought was in that van was actually _in_ the van.

It was no shock that Lex Luthor created clones, that he'd been working on the technology for years and years. He'd created Kon-El out of wholesale slivers of DNA, so his brilliance wasn't in question. Lex's motives were always in question though, never mind that if he'd worked for good he could've surpassed Einstein in the field of science, rather than modeling himself after Oppenheimer's darkest days. He'd been careful this time, too; the only things Bruce had to review were notes -- careful, detailed notes, but there were no pictures, no names, nothing. He didn't have enough information to figure out who he'd been cloning. He'd taken samples from Luthor and both of his bodyguards, and so he knew that the clone was at least partially modeled after Lex. The other part was something else, though, and the methods weren't the cutting edge of science. They were more like the methods used for creating Kon-El, who remained ageless, eighteen trapped in the body of a sixteen year old.

Another Kon-El? Why would his dying act be to recreate Kon-El? It didn't make sense, and yet it seemed to be. It seemed to Bruce that they needed to get back whatever, whoever, was in the van, and that meant contacting Clark against his better judgment.

Reluctantly, he sent the message via the Watchtower and settled back to wait. It wouldn't take long. It never did with Superman, which was simultaneously annoying and a relief depending upon the situation. Clark depended too much on brute strength for Bruce's liking. For all that Lex had gone over to the proverbial dark side, he would have thought that early exposure would have at least given Clark some vague idea of how to work his way through a problem without using a fist to break something before he was aware of how it worked.

The sound of rushing air whistled through the tunnel and he turned in his chair, scowling. "Superman."

There wasn't a great deal of difference between Clark Kent and Superman. It was in the way they stood, the way Clark slumped, the faint snifter of illusion cast by some alien tech that made his face harder, his eyes an icy blue the color of a deep autumn sky at midmorning. "Luthor was cloning again?"

"Yes." Bruce leaned up from where he was crouching. "And he's dead." He wondered if that would affect Clark at all, that knowledge, with Bruce stressing it. It might not, and the illusion tech was better at some times than others.

This was one of the times when it clearly wasn't up to the task, because he could see the change in expression, the way that his face seemed to twitch into something like regret. He recovered quickly enough. "Really dead this time?"

"'Really dead'," Bruce agreed solemnly, holding out the sheaf of notes for Superman. "He was working on a clone project very similar to Kon-El's development."

That did away with anything human and sent Clark's face reeling back to Superman. As expressive as he could be, Bruce had always wondered why he didn't wear a mask. "I'm guessing there's something worse than usual about that since you called me."

"Yes. Luthor died in the laboratory where the clone was, in Gotham. The others in the lab were murdered. His bodyguards are also dead. A truck was leaving the scene while I was performing surveillance on the location." It didn't quite explain the moment, the tension of it, the horror of realizing. "I don't believe Luthor was murdered, though he's still in autopsy."

There was something about the shift of that gaze. He knew something, and he hadn't bothered sharing it. "I'm pretty sure it was a form of leukemia. A lot of Smallville residents developed it late in life, especially ones who were at primary blast sites."

One more strange thing that Superman had brought to the planet. And Clark had known he was dying. "We need to find the clone."

Slow blink. "What makes you think I'm any more likely to locate it, or the people who took it, than you are?"

"It was headed towards Metropolis." He looked hard at Superman. "I know what you're capable of even if you pretend you aren't, Kent."

That got his attention, and the clench of that jaw matched his own. "I'll get on it. If they're in Metropolis, they'll probably be in Southside." Suicide Slum, and the urge for people to make things nice always made Bruce want to smirk. At least Gotham was honest about its dirty laundry.

Most of the time.

"If you don't find that van, one of my people will." Bruce watched Clark, just holding the pile of notes, not reading it. Just watched him, because there was nothing that made one of them twitch like the suggestion their territory might be invaded by another one. He was usually the worst, but Clark was all of a half step behind him.

Superman's voice was deep, banked fire hiding underneath those tones. "Keep your people out of Metropolis. And keep Red Robin's mouth shut."

"I can't make any promises. But if someone's willing to kill a lab's worth of scientists, and Luthor's bodyguards to get a clone...." Then it had to be something important, half Luthor, half Bruce didn't know yet. He would soon.

"Keep Kon-El out of this." He wondered if Kent ever tried that voice with Lois. If he did, it was a miracle they weren't divorced. Bruce was exquisitely familiar with how she would take an order like that. "He doesn't need to be involved." Then the flying bastard was gone, as if making an order-statement would be enough, and the Bats would all be obligated to take it as such.

It must be nice to think so.

* * *

  
Wild, spinning confusion. He woke up to it and it hadn't gotten any better when memories had flooded into his mind, had left him drifting and shell-shocked because there was no context for any of it. Faces and not-quite-thoughts and business, business business business, and concepts of development that were just at the cusp of his mind. None of it had settled, locked into place, which made the gag and the blindfold even worse, and he knew he was being tied down so he wouldn't escape -- escape again? -- even though he'd taken a beating.

By now, someone should have sent a ransom request to his father. Should have, but he could hear his father's voice in the back of his head, telling him that Luthors weren't afraid, that they didn't have the luxury. That he'd never get anywhere with his eyes closed.

That Luthors never, ever bargained with criminals, never paid ransom demands.

A ransom demand, once placed, could leave clues. It was a weakness on the part of his captors, just like leaving him unobserved, because he hadn't heard noise in the room in a little bit. He leaned forward in the chair, pulling at the ropes carefully. It was something he remembered doing before, remembered being kidnapped before, without knowing where to place it.

Just thinking about it gave him a headache. Of course, that could be incipient concussion; there seemed to be something about having a bald head that made people more inclined to hit him there, and that got old fast. Just thinking about it sparked recall, and he knew then that he was in Smallville. Had to be, because he'd just gotten there. Just made friends with Clark Kent, who'd pulled him out of the river when his car had gone through the rails of the bridge. He'd pulled the same Clark Kent down from a scarecrow post in the middle of a field just a few nights ago, maybe a few weeks. Maybe, but how had he gotten from there to here? Whatever fresh hell 'here' was.

He lowered his head, trying to chew through the gag, work it out with his tongue, get it loose from the knot at the back of his head. He multitasked that with the rope, concentrating. Escape first, then everything could make sense, because if he didn't save himself no one was going to save him. He'd learned that a very long time ago. It didn't pay to be Lex Luthor. At least not if he wasn't providing the funds, and that clearly wasn't the case here. He wondered who he'd managed to piss off, or if this was some kind of bizarre game his father had come up with to make him harder, stronger.

"Well." A voice cracked with age, and dammit. He hadn't been paying attention, hadn't been careful enough. Shit. "This is an interesting sight."

"Mmmph." Fuck, fuck, okay, he had someone who wanted to play cat and mouse, that was fine, he could, would turn that to his advantage. Somehow.

Surely?

"Lex Luthor. And so young. It's been a long time, Lex." That voice might be old, rough, but the man was practically purring. "I think I had forgotten how pretty you were. How... fragile." The touch of thick fingers at his jaw line made him jerk away, as far as he was able.

"Fghyh." He swallowed, trying a little harder to chew through the gag. Not that it was working. "Fugh!" He wasn't, was not, fragile. Never had been, and no one really remembered when he'd been a sickly kid.

The sound of that laugh was rough, cracked. "Hahaha. Oh. Oh, yes. And spirited, too. It'll be fun, fucking you into the ground. Worth paying for the privilege, even."

He howled against the gag, twisting, pulling hard at the ropes holding his wrists behind his back. "Ngh!" That was bad, that was very bad, but there was the hand at the side of his head, pulling at the knot on his gag.

"Go ahead, pretty Lex. Go ahead and say it all out loud. That'll be half the fun." And then some maybe, because he laughed when Lex tried to spit, and moved on to his chest. He had no idea what he was wearing, but it damn sure must be easy to open. There weren't buttons, just a slide of material over his skin, and he shook in reaction for a second before his mind played catch-up again.

Someone was running a hand across his chest, flicking a nipple with his thumb. "Fuck you! Don't touch me!" He swallowed, trying to dampen his mouth, trying to focus on, well, if the guy was going to hurt him, fuck him, okay, that meant he'd have to be untied from the chair, and that was a hopeful moment there.

Gravely laughter again. "Oh, as if you have any kind of choice. You're lucky I'm the first. At least I like using lube. Boys. If you'd move him to the bed, I'd appreciate it."

Boys. Boys, and he hadn't heard them in there, which scared him almost as much as the feeling of being lifted wholesale from the chair, and deposited face down on something. Mattress, bed, soft enough that if he didn't turn his head he was going to suffocate. "Please, I have money, I don't know who you are, if you let me go now there's no way I could press charges..."

"There's no way you could press charges anyway, Lex. You don't exist anymore."

He didn't believe it. Didn't want to believe it, was scared to believe it, whatever. Was terrified of the hands that were running down his sides, the tight pinch of fingers on his ass. He'd bruise for all of about a day from that, and why was he even worrying about bruises when there was obviously worse coming?

"I'm sorry, but I think my presence here disagrees with that statement. Clearly I exist. I..." Startled, inhaled hard when a finger pressed roughly against his asshole, enough to make him start to struggle again. If he could get a thigh against the edge of the mattress, maybe.

Maybe, but there were hands on him, fingers that didn't belong to the motherfucker molesting him. "Lex, Lex, Lex. You don't even know what you are." God, that hurt, scared the hell out of him. "The real Lex Luthor died before he could finish giving you all the parts of him. There's just this little shell left, and it isn't what anyone wanted. We'd have made more money if you had been whole, but as it is, you're young and pretty enough to make other kinds of money."

Other kinds of money. "You're insane, someone's going to, someone..." Someone would find him, find out, they couldn't get away with it forever, because he was _Lex Luthor_ , and he wasn't going to let it happen. Except it was happening, and the man behind him was sliding a slicked something, finger, maybe, up his ass.

He wasn't the only one laughing, and that made Lex try to struggle again, no matter how useless it was. "Lex, you're dead. Even your precious bodyguards are dead now, and who's going to come looking for you? The Bat? Superman? They'll just be glad that you're dead."

"No, no, this isn't like that, I don't know what you're talking about." Fingers were kneading his ass, steadily, squeezing and bruising just because they could. He wasn't sure whose hands were whose, except the finger in his ass was digging around, pressing hard, exploring and stretching and hurting. "I'm not dead, and you don't have to do this..."

Oh god. Oh god, oh god, oh god. "I don't have to do anything, pretty Lex. I only do what I want to do." Those were knees. Knees settled inside of his own, and he had to clamp his teeth down tightly to try and stop himself from begging like a coward.

He wasn't going to beg or break or cry, he wasn't. He was a Luthor, and Luthors didn't cry. Luthors didn't make big startled noises, either, when someone pushed their dick in balls deep with no warning, and fuck fuck fuck that hurt, that hurt like he'd never been fucked or stretched before, and Lex was pretty sure he was used to it. Or maybe he wasn't, and maybe the person fucking him was right.

Maybe he was dead. Maybe he was just some kind of, some clone or some alien thing, not a Luthor at all.

Not Lex.

And nobody was looking for him.

Nobody was going to save him from the heavy reaming thrusts that seemed to be forcing thick sounds up from the center of him and out of his throat.

"Ugh. Ugnh, stop, stop." It brought laughter, fingers at his hips flexing tightly.

"Do you want any other help, Mr. Edge?" Help, yeah, Lex needed help, Lex needed 911 called.

"Just hold him... ungh. Down. Oh, Lex, you're so tight. The boys will enjoy having you when I'm done, I think. And who knows who's lined up next?"

"There's a pretty good laundry list, just from the hometown crowd," one of the others commented, and Lex felt his shoulder shoved down hard, making his back arch just as the man behind him, Edge, oh, fuck, _Morgan_ Edge stroked into him.

Morgan Edge, his father's old buddy. "Anyway, stretch him out if you want. His black eye's already healed up." And his split lip, too. He'd never healed that fast before, and the sick realization that he wasn't. Wasn't who he thought he was.

Somehow, that was even worse than what was happening to him.

"Be... nnn. Grateful, Lex. There are those who'll come later who'll be impressed with the healing trick. Ahhh." Steady thrusts, pushing and aching and making him want to scream. "You'll learn to be pleased when all... nnnn. All somebody wants to do is fuck you."

No, he didn't think he would be. He didn't think he'd ever be delighted or pleased when someone wanted to fuck him, whoever he was. "Oh god. Oh, stop, just stop, I can't...." Wouldn't take it, couldn't think, didn't want to be there anymore, and the laughter all around was humiliating, was gruesome, was the most unbearable thing in the world at that moment.

It was a kindness, in a way, when he felt his face shoved into the mattress until he couldn't breathe, until blackness danced up from deeper in his head.

* * *

  
School sucked.

Maybe school didn't suck, but Smallville High did. It was eighteen kinds of boring, and sometimes Conner thought if he spent one more minute in Smallville pretending to be normal, he'd roll over and die, or maybe just wish that he could.

There were good things about it, he guessed. Namely weekends, and the occasional visit from a friend, somebody who _got_ what he was beyond Ma and Pa Kent, and, well. Clark, but Clark was all weird half the time and usually in a hurry to get back to Lois and the Daily Planet. Clark had a life, which was something Conner always really felt went unspoken except for the big neon sign declaring it that seemed to hover over Clark's head. And his clone-kid didn't fit neatly into the story, which left him Smallville and visits and a lot of wishing he could just sport around Metropolis like Clark did and do what he wanted to. That was pretty much anything that didn't involve being in Smallville and taking calculus.

"It's just this immense pain. I mean, seriously, what the hell good is calculus going to do me, anyway? It's not like it's practical or anything, and I'm not planning on doing anything that will involve me knowing calculus. So why is it that I have to suffer through this stuff?" All while looking the same age he'd looked when he first showed up in Smallville, and people had noticed. Usually assholes, but still. People.

"So you can say you took it when it's time to go to college," Tim offered. Like it'd done Tim any good, except it probably had. The Bats were all about thinking before they leapt, and that wasn't all that metaphoric.

"Where I'll still look sixteen when I'm supposed to be twenty-two." Maybe he was a little bitter about that. Possibly he was a lot bitter about it.

"Maybe we can..." Tim gestured a little. "I don't know. Tinker your genes. You'd think Clark could do something..." Yeah, except he didn't want to tinker with Kon-El's genes in case it all went wrong for him. Better to be eternally young than dead.

Conner gave him a dirty look. "The last time anybody screwed with my genes, I ended up powerless and lucky not to be dead. Magic or science, I'm pretty sure I don't want anybody messing with me."

"So being sixteen forever isn't so bad. Comparatively." Tim's face scrunched up. "And with Luthor gone, it's not like we have access to the real mastermind on it."

Comparatively. "So when I'm forty, I'll still be dating sixteen year olds." That had sounded all right two years ago. He had a feeling that when he was forty, it wasn't going to sound so good. "I can't believe he's dead." Luthor had been weird, but he'd also been strangely paternal at times. If he was still alive, maybe it would have been worth it to ask him for an answer.

There was no asking now, even if the whole world had frowned on it. "Yeah. That sucks." Tim's mouth pulled sideways. "And there's a lot of people you could ask for help, but they're kind of not the people you want to ask for help."

"I figured." Science types tended to get a little creepy obsessive to Conner's sure knowledge. He'd been poked and prodded enough in his short life not to want any more poking and prodding. "Why are we even being so morbid right now?" Sometimes, the conversation got away from him. "C'mon. There's pound cake in the kitchen."

"Ooo." Tim shifted, stood up fast. "That makes the trip all the way out here worth it." Plus it was a rest from whatever crap Tim was knotted up with thanks to Bruce.

Conner knew better than to ask; frankly, most of the time, he didn't want to know. The Bats were supremely dysfunctional, in ways that made Conner wish he hadn't spent way too much time watching Lifetime movies with Aunt Martha. It was like those vaguely skeevy shows where everybody had been molested and they kept not turning anybody in so the agony of it just multiplied until suddenly somebody was in jail and everybody else was in tears. "Are you kidding? That makes any trip worth it."

"Mmm. See, if I got food this good at home, I'd have never left." Tim stretched a little as he followed Conner. "Well, Alfred makes good dinner."

They thumped down the stairs from the loft steadily. "Yeah, but there's probably stuff like Brussels sprouts and, I dunno. Rack of lamb." There was something about rack of lamb that made him vaguely disturbed. Maybe it was that one year he raised a sheep for FFA. Cows didn't bother him much, but Uncle Jonathan was pretty matter-of-fact about what went on with the cows.

Cows got milked and cows got slaughtered and steaks had to come from somewhere. It made it easier. Sheep were still sort of soft and lovable, like big awkward dogs. "Things I can't pronounce, with a sauvignon sauce or something. He still knows that sometimes, life just needs Oreos."

"And milk, so long as Clark's not around. Otherwise, he probably drank from the carton." He was bad about that, and it kind of grossed Conner out a little. It was different if everybody had their own carton or carafe or whatever, but seriously. Clark was wrong like that. He paused on the porch and glanced back. "So... you gonna tell me what's been bugging you?" What the hell. It was better to ask, he guessed. At least then he'd know if the Bat was molesting his friend or whatever.

Definitely too much Lifetime.

"Luthor cloned again. Clark was going to find it." Oh, oh, that was casual and calm, except _Kon_ was the last time Lex had cloned. It made the hair stand up on the back of his neck, and he turned so fast to look at Tim that he nearly tripped.

"And nobody thought that oh, I don't know, telling me was a good idea?" A great idea, even, because seriously. What the hell. "And has Clark found it?" It. Her. Him?

"If he has, he's not saying. I'm not exactly on his talk-to list." No, probably not, but Conner sometimes wasn't, either. It wasn't anything for Tim to sound so wound up about, except he was getting the feeling there was more behind it than met the eye.

Maybe he should hold the pound cake hostage.

Instead, he pushed open the kitchen door and walked to the cabinet, pulling out a couple of plates, getting a knife. "So. There's a clone. Somewhere. You guys don't know what kind of clone, and you're not looking for it, you've just kind of left it to Clark, and nobody's bothered to ask any questions. And Luthor's dead."

"Yeah. He warned Bruce off, and I guess Bruce wasn't in the mood for the usual pissing contest with him." Tim shrugged tightly. "So. I guess if you want to go looking...."

Hell fucking yes, he wanted to go looking. "Well. It's not like we had anything else planned except bad movies and coffee and cake, is it? Think we should call Bart?" He'd be helpful. He'd gone kind of serious for a while, but maybe serious was called for. Plus, he would definitely be able to help cover more ground.

"Yeah. Can we get pound cake to go? I'll call Bart..." Yeah, because it might take all night or longer. Calculus wasn't going to happen, not that night.

Not any night, he thought, until he found the clone, and found out who it was.

* * *

  
He'd had enough champagne that even he was starting to feel a little tipsy.

For the most part, Bruce held a lot of glasses and faked drinking. He'd probably killed more plants than anybody else in Gotham, maybe even the Eastern seaboard. Sometimes, it was necessary to be more drunk than less, though, and he'd been watching Carl McEnoy watch him all night, as if he was gauging when the time would be right. He wasn't one of Bruce's usual business acquaintances, never mind friends, so it was damn suspicious.

Maybe he'd be drunk enough soon that he'd approach.

He wasn't sure when he'd managed to portray himself as quite drunk enough that McEnoy would approach him, so he took another swig and broke cautiously away from his momentary conversational partner. Give him an in, a moment of quiet, and grin a little too much. Just enough, and he walked away from the party, slipping out onto the balcony for a little peace and quiet. There was an awning there to keep the sprinkling rain off of any of the guests, and he settled himself against a column, looking out into the night. He couldn't see Nightwing there, but he knew he would be.

Easy to find if he needed him. He closed his eyes for a moment, listening to footsteps. "Mr. Wayne. Beautiful night, isn't it?"

Bruce turned and gave McEnoy a vague smile. "For Gotham. More drizzle than anything else, as if she likes to deck herself in sparkles." That definitely sounded more drunk than tipsy.

He laughed, sounding surprised. "You could say that. I was wondering if you were interested in a business proposition."

There was no helping the way his smile tilted, got a little sharper. "I'm always interested in business, Mr. McEnoy."

"I know you were no friend of Lex Luthor." That, that was an interesting opening remark, and it caught his attention more than he'd been expecting.

"Luthor and I were at Excelsior together. He was... a very difficult person." There. That was ambiguous enough, and clearly McEnoy knew he'd bought out LeXCorp, lock, stock and barrel. Anyone who didn't must have been living under a rock.

"Yes. Many people think so." There was a tilt of his head, and then he heard the odd tilt to the man's voice. "Are you interested in a little... well, I'm not sure how to say it. Pay for play, perhaps."

Interesting. It made his brows pull together, and he leaned forward, as if to catch every word. "I'm not sure I understand. I'd heard he was dead."

"You know as well as I do that some people don't stay dead." He stood up straighter. "Are you interested?"

Bruce allowed a frown to pucker his mouth for a moment before he shrugged. "Why not? I'm always interested in something new and fun." Mostly, he was interested in finding out what was going on, because Clark seemed to be failing on a grand scale.

Now the idea was back in his mind, and this was an interesting new turn. "Are you done here, then? If you are, I could take you to a, uh. Neutral ground."

Glancing back inside, he eyed the twin blondes he'd brought to the party. They seemed pretty happily occupied with the new mayor, so he could leave without feeling guilty. "Sure. Neutral ground sounds...."

"Good, good. Do you want to have your driver follow my car?" Not at all, but it was the kind of thing he was expected to nod his head up and down for, so he did.

"I'll let him know when we get downstairs." Because Alfred would be waiting, and if nothing else Bruce had the good sense to be sure he was followed. Even if he didn't say anything, Alfred would do it anyway.

"Good. I think you'll be very interested to see this." To see this, and Lex wasn't dead. But Luthor was dead, Bruce had seen it. Bruce had seen the autopsies. It was hard to get much more dead than autopsied, welling over with cancer in every cell.

At least now he knew exactly what Luthor was doing -- creating a clone of himself, using just enough DNA from some other metahuman to help augment the clone. He wasn't sure exactly how, and he still wasn't sure who, although he had his suspicions. Bruce followed McEnoy, stumbling vaguely now and then just to heighten the impression that he was drunk.

He kept it up through the walk to the man's vehicle, and a quick word with Alfred, before he joined McEnoy in his own limo. "It's not something we can talk about out loud, really. Morgan Edge has been managing this resource."

Morgan Edge. Just hearing that name sent ice down Bruce's spine, because the man should have been dead twenty years ago. He _had_ been dead, but that was the problem with the world. Sometimes, people just didn't stay that way. "Huh. That's interesting. He was a friend of Luthor's father, wasn't he?"

"Very close, yes. He never liked the young upstart, and as the years passed..." He'd probably become more and more of a threat to Edge, both in business and his existence. Luthor thought nothing of killing people who'd crossed him, something that had undoubtedly been bred into him from the time he was old enough to suck on an inhaler, never mind after the accident.

"He just disliked him more and more. This is all very interesting, McEnoy, but what kind of resource is this, anyway? You implied that there would be something fun in this trip for me."

"Edge has Luthor. A young Lex Luthor, but it's him all right. He doesn't really injure, not for long. You could pay a small fee to finally punch him in his smug mug, or maybe... a little more. Some of the fellows have enjoyed getting a leg up on him, so to speak."

Bruce allowed his mouth to curl upwards despite his urge to reach out and strangle the son of a bitch. "Well. I've had Lex at least once already. It might be interesting to have him again."

McEnoy laughed again, and that ratcheted his nerves up higher, tighter. "You can do whatever you like to him. He bounces back, tight as a virgin every time, which, believe me, is a miracle."

"Do tell." So he'd know who to hunt down later, because those kinds of indulgences were never one-time only sins. It was the kind of thing that people liked to do over and over again.

"Well, I don't think you want to hear, so much as see for yourself." Damn, and he was sure he could get something out of him. Now he was playing coy, baiting the customer. He was probably paid to do it, and that ramped up the flickering fire settled at the base of Bruce's spine.

Edge would have a list. He believed it, and he'd get Oracle on it, because he wanted to know every name. Each one.

"So what's the deal?"

"Five thousand an hour, and you can do anything you want. One guy had him for a week, and believe me, he tested that limit, but there's not a mark on him." Bruce had to believe that that kind of treatment was taking a toll on him mentally, there was no way it wouldn't.

Even if it _was_ Luthor, if he'd managed to transfer everything over to the clone, nobody deserved that. Not anybody. "I'm a little less inclined to slice out his liver, sauté it, and then feed it to him, so I guess nobody has to worry about me trying that hard to damage him. Is he in Gotham?"

They'd turned down street after dark street, driven through sparkling traffic lights for quite some time. It seemed a possibility that he might be, and it pissed him off that he'd allowed Kent to try and find him and left off looking.

"Tonight he is. He's moved around enough. Vandal Savage bought him for a night, and we thought he might just want to keep him. One of those." There were enough people who might want to have a Luthor to take apart without paying a fee that it probably made security dicey for them.

He whistled as if to show appreciation for their scheme. Well. They wouldn't have to worry about keeping him for much longer. Bruce would be the one doing the worrying before the night was out, and wouldn't that be a special kind of hell? "Maybe I should take back the comment about sautÃ©ed liver."

"Mmm. It all grew back. Like I said, he'll be virgin tight again, if you're interested." He was going to have to be interested in something, or provide some sort of distraction once he got to the facility.

"Considering I was the one who first had him when he really was virgin tight...." Bruce let the sound drawl out of his mouth. "It'll be interesting to see if it's true." They were pulling up outside of an older house, Victorian in appearance, well-kept.

"You let me know if it's as good as it ought to be." McEnoy opened the door when the vehicle stopped, held it open for him so he could get out, still feigning drunkenness.

"Sure thing." Sure thing, and he had to work hard not to jerk up his head, look at the sky. Just a sense, just a feeling, but it was better not to show he wasn't anywhere near as drunk as he seemed to be. Alfred pulled up behind McEnoy's Rolls, and it had better just be Nightwing up above.

At worst, Tim would be there, and Tim was competent. Tim wouldn't make things worse, in the long run. "If you want to take your coat off in the parlor...."

Bruce let his face curl into a vicious smile. "There's really no need." How he was going to hide that this was a result of the invitation, he wasn't sure. After hearing that Savage had been sniffing around, it was clear that he had to do something fast. No one deserved what Vandal Savage most likely had done, but Luthor disappearing immediately after Bruce Wayne was invited to partake of his... delights would undoubtedly cause people to ask questions.

Cause people to ask questions and make associations with him that Bruce preferred not be made. "Then if you'd like to move to a private room, we can send him in." McEnoy cocked an eyebrow.

He allowed a beaming smile to take over his face. "Just show me the...."

That was when something upstairs went off, loud, fierce, dust and wood and glass spraying down the stairs, the concussion from the blast knocking both of them off of their feet.

It felt like someone was taking it out of his hands entirely, but the urge to run towards the detonation to see what had happened was high. McEnoy scattered, hollering and yelling as he dove for the door. At least there wouldn't be anybody around to say Bruce Wayne was stupid enough to head straight for explosions like some kind of idiot. If anybody saw him now, he'd claim a head injury and confusion in the dust.

Charging up the stairs was stupid, but he did it anyway, heading for the area with the most damage. There was at least one gaping hole in the floor, and he jumped it like a moron, scrabbling for a second before he caught a hand on a crumbling doorway to keep himself from falling backwards into it. "Luthor!" Maybe he'd get lucky and Lex would be the one who'd set off whatever kind of bomb it was.

He didn't see him, though. Didn't see him, just saw Kon-El's backside before he was turning towards him, looking startled. "Mr. Wayne!"

Goddammit.

The curses that he bit back were sharp and bright and full of blood, and he narrowed his gaze to make up for it. "What the hell is going on here?"

"I could ask the same of you." He looked angry, and then he saw Tim come down from the hole in the roof.

"Kon, Kon, let's get him and _go_." He hardly looked at Bruce, which was years of training right there.

"Got 'im!"

Had they brought the entire league of junior superheroes for God's sake? Kid Flash skidded to a stop and bundled Luthor into Kon-El's arms. He didn't look at Bruce, either, just blurred out of existence, Red Robin disappearing at the same time. Blue eyes, Luthor eyes, looked at him out of Kon-El's face, and then he was gone, too, leaving Bruce in a blown-up house, grinding his teeth.

There was nothing to do but do what any businessman would've done when a whorehouse exploded: run.

He was going to _kill_ someone when this was all over.

* * *

  
He felt his way through consciousness, cautiously, carefully. He was on a mattress, which was devoid of any kind of comforting context now. He was on a mattress, and the room smelled antiseptic, which still meant very little, though he did remember, vaguely, standing there one moment, waiting for whatever dubious asshole wanted a shot at him, and then everything went to hell in an exploding hand basket.

It was possible to open his eyes; he was aware, despite the throbbing pain centered somewhere just above and between his brows. The idea of actually doing so was scarier than lying there not knowing anything, though. Most of the people who came in seemed to want him awake and extremely aware of what was going on.

The sound of a door opening brought new noises -- shuffling feet, conversation, steady soft beeps. "Hey, Conner."

Lex felt someone shift, moving away from the side of the bed. "Hey. Sorry, man, I just...."

The first voice interrupted. "You ought to go home and get some sleep. I'll stay."

Conner -- whoever that was -- gave a soft, short laugh. "You're just scared as hell if you go home, you'll get an earful."

"Fear implies I'm not going to be right."

Lex kept his eyes closed, carefully, trying not to modify his breathing. One or the other of them would leave, and then he could see if he could escape. The night before someone had cut his throat, and he could still feel the mark -- at least, while he'd been waiting for the last customer. It seemed like the more wild they got, the longer it took him to heal.

He didn't jump when Conner snorted. "It's never about being right between the two of them. Clark's already at the farm raising hell, so I'm pretty sure I know what your voicemail sounds like. He hasn't been out yet, though."

"Yeah, well. He sent Dick, not that it was a problem. Dick just kind of pointed and laughed and talked about how irate he was when he realized we'd got there first. I think he's concentrating on Clark for now, so I'm not worried about a pissing match until the two of them have scrapped it out."

Clark. Clark, he knew Clark, though if Clark knew him anymore, if Clark wanted to fuck his ass raw like everyone else in the damn world seemed to want to do, that was a question that he wasn't sure he could see answered out.

"Yeah. Aunt Martha's not having any of it. She asked me to come home and get some rest, but I'm okay. You ought to head back. At least one of us should be... you know. Bart checked in, but I'm...." The sound of a yawn came. "Sorry, man. Seriously. I can sleep anyplace."

"Okay. I'll catch some z's at your place tonight, then come by in the morning. You know how to get me if you need me." Leaving just one of them, and he was curious if Conner was someone from whom he could escape. He'd have to go back to sleep eventually from the sound of it, so he just had to be patient and wait.

"Will do." The door shut, and all of those tempting external noises cut off with it. Silence reigned for a long minute, then another, before Conner spoke again. "Hey." Maybe he was on the phone. "I know you're awake."

Shit. There was no point in denying it now that he'd been caught, and he was still unbound, which was something. "What do you want?" He opened his eyes finally, warily. The room was painted a ridiculous shade of purple-blue, filled with medical equipment, a television flat against one wall. There was a door that seemed to lead out, one that probably led to a bathroom, and he felt relief when he realized they were the only ones in it.

Once he'd determined that, he turned his eyes to the boy sitting beside him. Not a man; he was too young for that, even though he was fairly big, broad through the chest and shoulders. Conner, assuming that was actually his name, had dark hair that lay in curls close to his head, big blue eyes, a soft mouth and earrings in both ears. "You know, I have no idea." It sounded as if it surprised him. "I just found out about you two days ago, and... yeah. I don't know that I really want anything."

"Am I free to go?" Conner looked familiar, though he couldn't place why. He just... looked familiar, twigged something in the back of the broken set of memory banks he had in the recesses of his mind. He lifted fingertips to his neck, feeling at the mark that felt like it was almost gone, now. Again.

The way his eyes widened, looked somehow startled or stricken, that was familiar, too. "Well, I guess. You may want to stick around another couple of days, though. I mean, it's pretty clear to me that you're probably some kind of metahuman. You heal too fast not to be. But..." He took a deep breath. "My name's Conner, and I'm a clone. I kind of know how these things work. A little."

Clone. That didn't seem real, but Lex knew that he didn't seem real most of the time, and let his hand fall back to the bed sheet. "Is this normal?"

The funny laugh that got him seemed off, but what did he know? "Oh, man. I don't even know. Sometimes, it seems like the only thing that's normal is being abnormal. I don't know all of the details about how you were made. The guy that made you was, used to be, president. Lex Luthor. He's... When they made me, half my DNA came from him, and half from, well. From Superman. You know who they are or?"

"I thought I was Lex Luthor." He squinted hard at 'Conner', sitting up a little more. "You look like Clark. Kent. I remember. He was this kid in town, he pulled me out of the river." He wasn't even sure why he was saying that, except if Conner were sympathetic, maybe he wouldn't do anything to Lex.

That quirk of mouth. It was so familiar that it ached. "Yeah, you know, before I ended up in this hick place, I never knew about that. I mean, he never said. Never talked about it, like it was either a secret or... I don't know. But I heard about that. People have long memories in small towns." He tilted his head, and there was something there -- the shape of his eyes or the color, or the line of his nose. It was different enough, semi-familiar in that looking-in-the-mirror kind of way that ought to have been weird.

It wasn't.

Conner continued. "So, yeah. There was a lot of weird DNA wrangling going on, and I'm a result. So are you, except rumor has it they went back to the old formula. Which, seriously, I know how weird that sounds, right? The old formula. But..." He shrugged. "I'll explain all of that sometime later. There're a couple of superheroes out there having kittens right now, swearing up and down that you're Lex Luthor, too. That's another reason you might want to stick around a day or two. I know a guy. He said he'd come by, do one of his mind tricks. Check you out, verify whether you are or not. If you listen to Superman, he'll say I didn't know Luthor well enough to understand and be afraid of him, but...."

But. Whatever it was, he wasn't afraid of him. Lex sat back, pulling at one of the pillows that had been behind his head. "When can I get out of this hospital?"

He watched Conner, the way he reached up and rubbed the back of his neck. "Like I said. Give it a couple of days. You're probably safer here with me watching you until the Manhunter comes down and clears you. Clark'll be a suspicious asshole, and the Bat is always a suspicious asshole, so really, you're better off. Also," and he seemed so damned earnest, "I have no idea what was going on with you, but maybe you could use some therapy or something."

He gave a shaky laugh, crossing his arms over his chest. "Luthor had a lot of enemies."

"So does Superman. I figured out way back that nothing sucks worse than being the guy they all come looking for when they think you're what's left. Except, you know, I think you had it way worse than me. I at least have this." Conner reached out and touched the rail on the bed. It wobbled slightly, and then rose smoothly into the air a foot or so before he gently leveled it back down.

"How...?" He'd never seen anything like that, never thought something like that could happen. How was it scientifically possible? How was _he_ possible, how were clones possible?

"You know, that's a good question. I'll be honest, though, I'm not the guy with the answers. I'm just the guy who tries to use what I've got for good. Frankly, if the how involves calculus, we're both screwed if I'm the guy who has to explain it." Conner seemed honest. It was a lot more than he'd gotten out of people so far.

Still, there was a good chance it was a cover for something else. He watched Conner for a minute, and finally said, "Any chance of us getting a bite to eat?"

There was something so good about that grin, the warmth of it, the nearly simple happiness in the face of food. "Yeah, sure. I can call Tim, he probably hasn't gotten far. The Talon should still be open, and I'll bet they've still got some of Aunt Martha's pies. You'd have to be dead or stupid not to like those."

"Martha Kent?" He tilted his head a little, still watching Conner's face because he did look like Clark and Martha. Maybe it was the Kent family, all over again, and that made his stomach drop sickly even as Conner was hitting cell buttons.

"Yeah, she... Hey. He's awake. No, idiot, don't tell Clark. Just... huh? No. No, he's hungry, and you have no idea how bad the food is here. Yeah. Just stop by the Talon or..." He paused and looked at Lex. "Do you like anything else? I mean... what? Down near Arby's? Does that sound okay with you?" The double conversation made his head hurt.

"Yes?" Yes, anything sounded fine, anything at all, as long as he could eat and rest and not worry for a minute that someone was going to take him apart limb from limb again.

"Yeah. Whatever's.. yeah. And hey, some of those apple things, too." He was looking at Lex, a kind of judging expression. "Make that at least four or five, 'cause seriously. It's like Bart when he runs too much and doesn't eat enough."

He adjusted the pillows again, trying to make himself comfortable, trying to build the bed up into something that wouldn't hinder him if he had to move fast. He waited for Conner to hang up before he said, "Morgan Edge is going to be looking for me."

"No," Conner said, head tilted to the side. "He really won't." His mouth quirked a little, and he glanced away. "Some people would say it's in my DNA. I'd say... sometimes there are fortuitous accidents. It's not like I knew the crazy old bastard would be in the next room watching when we blew our way in."

"Oh. Ohh." Okay, and that was very all right, because Lex had spent too many times -- and if he was honest, once was more than too many times -- beneath that bastard to care that he was dead, regardless of what other history he might've had and didn't remember having with him.

The way Conner moved reminded Lex of Clark, who had saved him, and it made him shiver. "So, uh. You're not... you're not pissed or you don't think I should have been more careful or....?"

"After what he did to me, I would've liked to push a wall onto him myself." He didn't want to say what Edge had done to him, though, didn't ever want to think about it again, but it was the â€˜don't think about white elephantsâ€™ trick.

Conner cleared his throat and shifted, leaning back in his chair. It seemed that he must have been leaning with his head on Lex's bed earlier, sleeping, and that was easier to think about, a hell of a lot closer to innocent. "So. Yeah. A wall, and you know. Some pipes. And possibly, uh. But anyway. So. Manhunter's gonna come and do his mind-games and be sure you're not the whacked out ex-president and then... I don't know, actually."

Not knowing was oddly acceptable to Lex, and he wasn't sure why that was. "What if I am? Him, I mean. I remember things, but..."

"But until the Manhunter's here, Clark would tell me not to take anything you say at face value. On the other hand...." He eyed Lex seriously. "I don't think you are him. Clark gets all hysterical about it, but he doesn't understand that not everything comes across the way it should. Luthor did it the old way, the way they did me, and there's stuff we'll have to talk about later. But the thing is, it'll be okay. Just. It will be."

Mostly, he suspected Conner was telling him that because he wanted it to be. It was a childish sort of assertion, but Lex wanted to believe it. Maybe he could if he hadn't been half-killed in ways he couldn't comprehend in the last couple of months. "Well. At face value, this is... better than before."

There was something about the way those blue eyes skittered away for just a nanosecond before turning to Lex, and he knew that statement was understood. "Yeah, well. I'm pretty sure nothing could be much worse. We destroyed all of the hard drives, the backup tapes. Tim took some stuff to figure out where they were uploading for data backup."

"Tapes?" Lex half-hoped his voice didn't break as badly as it felt it had, grimacing as he pulled anxiously at the sheet. He was going to start unraveling it if they kept him there long.

Conner's jaw clenched down, grim. "Yeah. Maybe I shouldn't have told you, but it's always kind of pissed me off when people lie to me. Don't worry about it. I told you, Tim'll figure it out and when he does, it'll be gone. The hard copies were a big part of the explosion."

Shit. Shit shit, Lex closed his eyes for a moment, rubbing at his temple. "I hate to ask this, but why? Why bother, why go to this trouble..."

Silence stretched, long and thick and filled with all the things he didn't know how to say, things he was afraid he might hear, things he never wanted to see tumble out of anyone's mouth. When he finally opened his eyes, Conner was watching him steadily, thoughtfully. "The truth? I don't know. At first, when I found out, all I could think was... maybe it was somebody else like me. Somebody who didn't really belong, I guess. I had to find you. I had to know. I had to... I don't know. Do something. And now that I have... well. I don't know. But I'm gonna keep going."

It wasn't anything he didn't want to hear, but it wasn't anything he could do anything with. It wasn't... It wasn't useful, and Lex wondered why it had to be useful at all. "Okay. I -- Okay."

Okay, and the door opened, revealing a tall, good-looking guy with a bag full of food. Lex wondered if he'd seen the videos, since he was clearly the one who'd be tracking them down. "I figured you'd both be starving. I already know you can eat a cow all on your own."

Not that he needed to ask about the videos or ever see them again himself, because he'd been there, remembered more than enough for the rest of his life, remembered things he hadn't thought were physically possible, never mind survivable. Conner was all grins for the new guy, dark haired, too, and Lex just tried to file this one away, what he looked like, who he was. Conner had called him Tim.

"So, are you going to introduce me or what?"

"Or what. Tim, meet Alex. Alex, this is Tim." Conner looked over at him and shrugged. "I figured it couldn't hurt to kind of hide who you... well, you aren't. Or could be. So we kind of finagled you some ident, and some insurance." Clearly Tim was pretty good, or he supposed that he had to assume as much.

"And insurance." Lex leaned back a little. "What's my new last name?" Alex wasn't that hard a transition to manage, if it had to stick.

Tim was pulling roast beef sandwiches out of the bag, drinks set on his tray. "You know, I don't know...."

"You didn't."

"Well, I mean, if he was gonna be in Smallville, it was just logical, and..."

Conner was spluttering, and he looked like he might try to kill his friend.

"What is it?" Lex had to ask, leaning forward a little. He wanted to eat and he didn't want to be in the hospital room, but at least there was a distraction present.

"Well, I figure, the Kents are here, it'd be funny if Conner was in the room with a stranger, and..."

"I'm totally going to kill you." And he probably could, with the weird whatever it was he had done earlier. It made Lex's adrenaline spike, and he took a deep, unsteady breath. "And bury you in the back forty. And when Bruce and Dick come looking for you, I'm gonna say you ran off to San Francisco with a passing troupe of gay circus performers."

That. That sounded less realistic. Tim laughed, a burst of noise that startled Lex, and then Tim was handing him a bag of junk food, too. "Oh, c'mon. Take a joke. It was easier that way."

"Yeah, you're such a jerk. Give up your apple thing, Alex needs at least three. It's your punishment. 'cause, you know, it's either that or the circus performers, and who knows? Dick might even traumatize us with stories about growing up in the circus if I tell him that. Oh god." Conner was already biting into food and humming around it.

"Dick has great stories about the circus," Tim countered, pulling up a chair for himself, door safely closed now. Lex opened the bag of food, half-watching them. He was ravenous, but he didn't really think he could eat as much as Conner was suggesting. He hadn't felt like eating much, but mostly because there'd been so much pain going around.

"Dick has stories about the mustached lady eating out the fat lady on stage. And it just devolves from there. Those are in no way great stories. They're a bizarre excuse for porn, and I'm pretty sure he's lying about it just to see what we'll say. I mean, seriously, what the hell." Well. Anything he didn't eat, Conner clearly would, because he'd moved on to the second sandwich. Tim was halfway watching him, and halfway watching Lex -- Alex. Adjusting to thinking of himself like that was going to be different.

He didn't think it'd go well or steadily, and it made him wonder what was going to happen to him. "That's..." Lex started to eat his sandwich. "Disturbing and tasteless. Is this Dick Grayson, uh... shit, little kid Bruce took in?"

Huh. The vaguely appalled look on Tim's face was kind of awesome, but Conner was grinning at him. "Yeah. That's the one."

"Kon." The sound was deep, serious.

"Shut up, Tim."

He took his time chewing through the roast beef, and took another bite before he half-asked and half said, "I have memories. I'm not... some blank slate. I went to Excelsior with Bruce."

Conner was nodding, as if it made sense to him. Probably it did. "See, that's the thing, right there. It's... when you're a clone, stuff doesn't upload right. I mean, it's not like I ever got memories from either of my DNA donors, I just got a lot of public information and weird personality stuff from another donor. And frankly, none of that came out right. It... I was... I dunno. It just wasn't like you think."

"Yeah, except you didn't wake up thinking you were in your sophomore year of Smallville High," Tim pointed out to Conner, and that made no sense to Lex but he supposed it would in time.

"Public information. Weird personality stuff from another donor. Of course I didn't." Apple turnovers were being placed close enough for Lex to reach them. "But he got at least a partial upload. It makes sense to go chronologically. Otherwise, if you upload out of memory order, there's... you haven't got anything that current thought was built on. Right, Alex?" He looked like he expected an answer, too.

"Logically." He swallowed. "If I thought it was plausible to make clones of myself that are unkillable, if I were going to, to move myself to a new, young, healthy body, I'd try to roll as much of myself over as possible, starting with the earliest."

"See? It's just all what makes sense." Conner shrugged. "So, I think he only got so far before it was just. Too much. You're the one with access to the lab notes."

Tim groaned. "No, no I'm not. Clark had them. Clark took them, just like we thought Clark was..." He gestured at Lex. Like Clark was supposed to do something about Lex, he guessed, and it made his mouth a little too dry to keep chewing.

"Maybe when I said Clark was gonna be a suspicious asshole I should have just said total asshole." That was a vicious scowl, and Lex startled when he realized his tray and bed were both trembling slightly, as if in time with Conner's pulse. "Tim...."

"Yeah, I know. You want the notes. Well, so do I, and Bruce may have them by now. I figure he's been on it since he figured out Clark wasn't looking. And hey, maybe he was being an asshole, but there was total chaos for about two weeks there."

"A tsunami is a shitty excuse."

Lex braced himself a little, half-expecting an earthquake right there in the room. "I think it's a pretty good one," Tim shrugged. "What do you prefer, that, or that it slipped his mind?"

The bed stopped vibrating in slow degrees. "He's not supposed to forget things."

"Everyone forgets things." Sometimes because it was easier to forget than to remember, and why did he know that? Lex chewed a little more, with the vibration ending. It made it easier to try to at least finish one.

"Yeah, well..."

The door pushed open, and Lex was pretty sure he wasn't going to finish anything else at all. Clark was... he'd just met him. He'd looked a lot like Conner, green-eyed, all innocence and farm-fresh, and there he stood. There were wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, and that frown looked like it was permanent, and just seeing him made Lex nauseated.

"... _some people_ aren't supposed to forget important things. Like you."

That was Clark, standing there looking old but. But, he wasn't, and he was, and that made it more real than any of the slurs he'd had thrown at him, half-remembered business partners of his father fucking him with anger in their eyes. "Hello, Clark."

For a moment, he was scared of the reaction. He didn't know why; it wasn't like Clark would hurt him, but then, he'd been surprised at the number of people willing to do that. "Hello, L... Alex." There was a sarcastic spin on that word, and Conner was on his feet, Lex's bed vibrating again.

"Don't be a jerk, Clark."

Since that was Conner's first assumption of Clark, he wondered what had gone wrong between them. "Conner and Tim were just telling me about the tsunami. I guess you've come a long way since I pulled you down off the scarecrow pole a couple of days ago."

The clench of that jaw made him tremble, and he tried hard not to show it. "Conner and Tim are grounded until they die, Luthor."

"Not Luthor." It was surprising to hear Tim speak up. "Or at least maybe not. J'onn's coming to take a look."

"I don't know who you are." He said it blandly, watching Clark. "I... I know I hit you with my car, and you're interesting, and I _hit_ you with my car, but... I'm not sure when you joined the rest of the, everyone, in hating me."

He clearly did; in a way that was honestly disturbing for Lex to see. "Of course you'd say that, Luthor."

It was a surprise to see him suddenly pushed back against the door. "Fuck off, Clark. You don't know anything about this. You don't want to know, you've never asked, you just. J'onn's coming. At least wait until he does his thing before you decide to be a total dick."

"I think it's a little late for that." Lex started to wrap the bit of his sandwich remaining in the foil whatever it was. Wrapper thing that seemed pre-shaped. It was funny that the food still tasted the same, who knew how many years later.

Clark was looking at them all now, and he seemed like he was two steps away from making an ultimatum when he sighed. "Conner. I knew you'd feel this way about it."

"Well, how the hell else am I supposed to feel about it?" He was looking across at Clark, and it was amazing to see the differences and the similarities. "Am I just supposed to think, hey, awesome, they're pulling out all those super-special old techniques, there must be something hinky going on? And just what do you know about being a clone, anyway? You think forgetting him, not looking for him, is an awesome way to deal with something?"

So, someone had been supposed to be looking for him, and it was Clark, and he hadn't. "Did you know where I was?" It came out in a blurt, but he had to know. Just. Had to, because this Clark and his Clark didn't mesh. They were nothing alike.

Those green eyes had been so friendly. Lex didn't think anybody had ever looked at him the way Clark had, and it hurt to have them cut him with a glance. He hadn't realized he could be hurt like that anymore. "I wouldn't even leave you in a situation like that." It felt better when he looked away. "Bruce is waiting."

"For...?" Tim waved a burger a little, and that was funny. No one had ever really smarted off to Bruce in school and maybe they'd needed to.

"For you to get back to the farm and back to Gotham."

He didn't move. "Gotham's not my only city, you know."

Pissing contest. And he might not have left Lex in a situation like that, but he didn't look for him in the first place. "I, I can tell you don't all get along. Can you go fight over shit I don't remember doing, somewhere that isn't this room?"

Conner sat down again and poked a turnover in Lex's direction. "I'm staying. Clark, you can go back to the farm."

Clark looked like he was about as interested in going back to the farm as Lex was in talking to him. That meant not at all, given that the man seemed incapable of anything other than scowling. The turnover being prodded at him was a different story, and he didn't much feel like eating.

Tim got to his feet and rolled his shoulders. "Kon's staying. I'll at least come back to the farm, but all things considered, somebody needs to be here with him at all times, whether he's Luthor or only the beginnings of him. We stole him from Morgan Edge, and Edge died, so I'm pretty sure somebody's going to be looking for the people responsible."

That was what Lex was most afraid of. He picked up the turnover, still not quite eating it. "So much for hoping that was all over."

"It is over." Conner believed it, but Lex had a bad feeling that Conner had a tendency to be a little overconfident, or maybe he was just that kind of optimist. Lex never had been. "I'm going to make sure that it's over."

Lex looked sideways at Clark, wondering what was going through his mind and if it mattered at all. He gave up, took a bite of his turnover instead. He was just going to have to take it for face value, because there was no one offering him a change on the dollar trade value for a more sure thing.

Clark just kept looking at Conner, and it seemed like he wanted to say something. He didn't, just straightened his spine and back a little more tightly and shook his head. "We need to talk."

"And we can, whenever J'onn has come by and me and Alex go home. Or I'm pretty sure I can go back to work in Metropolis if that doesn't suit everybody."

"Or you could say it now," Lex suggested, swallowing a bite. Just because he half-thought it might piss Clark off. Funny, really. He'd been halfway in love with the kid just a few days ago, and now he wasn't just huge, he was kind of a bastard, too.

The way Clark's face tightened, took on a deeper sort of harshness, made him fight back a shiver. "When you get home," he said again, and turned for the door, opening it and stepping outside.

Tim rolled up the sack nearest him and set it on the end of Lex's bed. "See if you can get him to eat some more, huh? He looks like something out of a bad eighties cartoon."

Conner nodded. "Yeah, well. I don't think he looks that bad, but... I'll do my best. And..." He glanced at the door. "Thanks."

"Not a problem." Tim hesitated for a moment. "Well, it might be a problem, but anything for you. I'll see you tomorrow." Lex was sure that Tim would, _would_ be back, so he gave a semi wave to him when he left, more welcoming of his presence than Clark's, and god, what had happened to Clark?

"Sorry." The apology was quiet, serious. "I told you he can be kind of a suspicious asshole. Things, uh. Things were bad between him and the old you."

"I just met him. I, he saved my life, he was..." Something else, something wonderful and amazing. "He gave me hope again. I don't understand how it came to this." Him in a hospital bed, chewing on a turnover and looking at a somewhat Clark look-alike.

Conner's face scrunched up, and that was heartbreakingly familiar. It had made Lex wonder on occasion if Clark was stupid, but this time it seemed to say something different. Maybe it was the same mirror-reaction he'd had earlier. He didn't know. "It's a long, confusing story, in which Clark lies, and Luthor investigates him, and Luthor's father gets involved, and I think Clark finally hit Luthor in the head one time too many. Nobody's been kind enough to give me the entire gist of the story, that's just what I've managed to weasel out of everybody."

"And somewhere in there, I... Lex, me, whoever, turned evil?" He mentally put quote marks around that word, because he didn't feel evil, and he couldn't see how the path would get there. Ambition was just that, just, he didn't want to manage a shit factory forever.

"I think maybe there were a lot of external forces at work. You know. Lionel Luthor wasn't exactly anything to sneeze at, and I figure Clark had to start being a suspicious jackass sometime. Point is," Conner told him, unwrapping one of the apple turnovers, "I don't know the whole story."

"Neither do I." That was going to drive him crazy, but he didn't need to say that. "My father was a crazy, controlling bastard."

Broad shoulders shrugged. "Well, I'd say at least you had one, except sometimes? I think all those old aphorisms are seriously wrong and fucked up." He paused, starting at Lex. "You look tired. I mean, you've been asleep for most of the last day or so, but...."

"Thanks for bringing food. I appreciate it." And while Kon wasn't making his exit, Lex was finishing his turnover and after the better part of a sandwich, he felt full, sated for the moment. It felt good to eat, and just. Rest. Not be afraid that whoever stepped in next was going to do something unspeakable.

"Yeah, well." Conner colored a little at that. "It wasn't like calling Tim was all that hard."

Except he had no support system and no one who was looking for him and no identity, no one who cared, so if he dropped off the face of the Earth again, no one would notice. Except Conner, who'd saved him. "You didn't have to."

"There are a lot of things I don't have to do. I do them because I want to." That seemed enough for him, like it explained everything. "Plus, Tim's kind of right. You could stand to gain ten or twenty pounds. Call it self-defense. There's this redheaded nurse who keeps coming in and giving me the evil eye, like it's my fault you're so skinny."

Lex laughed, more of a snort, and he nudged the table tray away from himself a little. "Yeah, well, it's going to take a while to get that back."

"Especially if we end up back in Metropolis, because I can't cook for shit." He was pretty earnest about it, and then he smiled. Lex was going to have to get past the similarities in a hurry. "But hey. We'll do okay, if that's the way it works out. Don't worry or anything, all right?"

It was going to be hard not to worry, but Conner was smiling. "You mean dialing for take-out isn't cooking?" He started to close his eyes, though.

"Well. So long as you don't expect fried chicken for Sunday dinner. It's good we're clear on these things."

Yeah. Clear on that. Not clear on much else, and he didn't even understand why Conner was taking him on, why he was sticking out his neck, but all of that...

It could wait.

* * *

  
He'd been waiting at the farm for nearly two hours.

If Martha Kent attempted to feed him one more slice of pie, he was going to take it and shove it so far down her Kryptonian son's throat, he'd end up trying to shit out Bruce's fist.

It wasn't her fault, because Bruce was sure that Clark became apple pie and America and just flushed his brains down the toilet, which she had no control over. None. He was just tired of waiting, and wound up when Kent arrived with Tim looking angry in tow.

"Don't even start," was out of Tim's mouth before they got into the house properly. "Just. Don't start. Sparky here wasn't getting it done, and neither were you, so both of you can go hold your pissing match outside. Sorry, Mrs. Kent." That apology was a lot nicer than anything he had to say to either of them.

"Is Conner coming home tonight?" Martha directed that at Tim, who shook his head. Bruce had seen Jonathan Kent when he'd come in. He'd be finishing his rounds soon, and then they'd have two grimly cheery Kents to deal with.

Clark looked like he'd been sucking on a lemon. "He's staying with Luthor."

Clark's mother made a noise that Bruce wanted to categorize as thoughtful. "I remember when that was you, Clark. He's just a boy."

"And after I told you about him, you didn't pursue it after you warned me off," Bruce snapped. He shouldn't have listened, shouldn't have actually respected Superman's territory.

It was kind of funny to see anger and embarrassment mingle on his face, or it would be if Bruce could bring anything resembling humor to the table. "I was looking. There was a tsunami...."

"Which you took care of nearly three weeks ago," Tim murmured from where he was reaching for the coffee pot. It was possible that Mrs. Kent's presence was the only thing that kept him from being immolated.

"...and before you can rescue somebody, you have to be able to find them." Clark sounded bitter. "It's not like somebody's going to walk up to a reporter and ask them if they'd like to have a little dirty fun with a Luthor clone."

Which was exactly what had happened with Bruce, but he wasn't going to remark on Clark's misplaced bitterness. "You warned me off of it. If I thought you were unable to find him, I would have tried rather than stumbled over it myself." Never mind super hearing, or x-ray vision.

"He wasn't in Metropolis by the time I tied up some of the larger issues at hand." Frankly, it sounded like bad excuses. "So I traced him to Edge City. By the time I got there, they'd moved him again. Lois and I have been following the money for weeks and getting there half an hour short of him being moved again, so don't start in on me about not being able to find him."

He gritted his teeth. "Tim, Kon and Bart managed to locate him in... a very limited amount of time." That was all he was going to say. He wasn't going to outright accuse.

"Three hours. The data stream coming out of that place was immense. Thanks, Mrs. Kent." Pie. Tim was going to sit there and eat pie and look smug. The damnable thing was that he had taught him those things, and the faint guilt was at the very least uncomfortable. Tim had learned well, proceeded... very, very capably. Bruce looked over at Clark again, wondering what he was going to say. There wasn't much point in pressing it further, because Clark would hem and haw and nothing would change. They needed to decide what came next.

"So." Tim cleared his throat, and Bruce hated that he and Clark were both giving him dirty looks. "J'onn's coming by to take a look at him, see what's up in his head. We're not stupid, and maybe it's not all Kent's fault. After all, he went at it from a writer's kind of angle, following paper trails, and we had Bart."

Bart made things so much... quicker. He almost grimaced at the punnishness of it, but there it was. "And if he is Lex Luthor, we need a plan."

"I have a plan." Clark took the pie when his mother finally handed him some, eying him worriedly. "There are Kryptonian facilities, prisons. I have the necessary technology to create one for him."

"Clark, I remember Lex when he was young. It could have gone... differently," Martha said mildly. "If his father hadn't been in town. If he could have trusted someone more closely. He tried very hard...."

"Not hard enough."

Bruce could remember Lex when he was a weird kid, ears sticking out, pale face, comic books stashed in his dorm room. He could imagine a Lex that tried, even if he had the same basic doubts as Clark did.

"Oh, for the love of god, Clark. He went through hell. How many wives? Abandoned on a desert island? Electroshock? Being drugged constantly? And those are just the ones that come to the top of my head." It almost surprised him that Martha snapped, but clearly if they were going to talk in Martha's kitchen, she wasn't going to stand by silently, and Bruce knew it. They all knew it just then.

It made Tim a little wild-eyed. "And, uh. Rumor has it there was a lot of head injury going on in Smallville. Just. You know. Saying."

"At least once a week." Martha moved back from the table, and Tim's wild eyes. It was hard to guess if she was joking or not.

"We'll let J'onn assess the situation," Bruce agreed, past and over top of Tim and Clark.

He was unsurprised by Clark's reluctant nod. "Besides. Conner's not going to leave him until we've got all of this settled. And I'd be surprised if he did, then. What is it that he thinks, that he's gotten some kind of cloned brother?" That question was probably more for Tim than anything else.

Tim shrugged, waving his fork a little after a bite. "I don't know. That there was a reason this one was made the same way he was, I guess."

"So that he'd never age or die?" The sarcasm inherent in that suggestion was unavoidable.

"Hey, and it might've been. I don't know what he was thinking when he kicked it."

Very few people could follow Luthor's thinking when he was sane, never mind when he was out of his mind. He'd been mostly insane for years, Bruce thought, but sometimes the idea of death changed people. Knowing that they could die, would die, changed people. It had never changed Luthor before, but there was a first time for everything.

Maybe it was the first time he honestly believed it was going to take, to be for keeps this time. Maybe he'd felt the finality of it.

Bruce wondered what other things he'd readied for the event of his death that might be lurking.

* * *

  
Two months.

Perhaps at one time the target date for release would have been less. It had changed more than once over the years -- six days, two weeks, never longer than a month. Distance from the lab site had never been a consideration, only the current activities surrounding LeXCorp and its founder.

The process was automated. If verification of current status was not provided during the required timeframe, the system would boot and begin a thorough search for necessary information even as programmed routines commenced discharge of the primary backup units. Secondary and tertiary units were re-designated and moved up in line for ejection and initiation.

Nutrient fluid spilled into channels, flowing away to be cleaned and recycled or disposed. Mechanized systems shifted forward, removing lines, drains, tubes, and finalizing the expulsion.

When they came to awareness, there was only one consideration: find Lex Luthor.

At all costs.

* * *

  
The Fortress of Solitude was the geekiest name ever for a barn loft, but it had stuck over the years. Hearing Uncle Jonathan call it that meant that Conner had this inescapable idea of it as just that, no matter how dorky it was. It didn't even matter that Clark had replaced it with some kind of weird Kryptonian ice-palace that went by the same name. The barn loft had come first, and the barn loft was going to remain the Fortress of Solitude. It was Conner's now, and Clark was intruding with his big heavy glare and ridiculously huge crossed arms. It made Conner pissed that he'd never actually hit thirty or so when strong turned to built like a mack truck.

"If you keep up with that look, you're gonna set the entire place on fire, Kal-El." Might as well call it the way it was, anyway. He was tired, sleeping at the hospital sucked ass, and he didn't feel all that confident leaving Tim alone with Alex. Tim was a great guy, but sometimes he folded when the Bat wanted something bad enough.

Conner didn't put it past Clark or Bruce to be plotting something. Scheming was in their nature, Bruce's more than anyone. "What were you thinking? What _are_ you thinking?" Oh, this wasn't going to be good. This was going to end up with them busting out the doors to the loft and scrapping until Uncle Jonathan took out the hose or something.

"I don't know, what were you thinking? I mean, all I knew was Luthor was trying to create a clone the way I was created. I wanted to know who or what that was. You, on the other hand, had the notes and knew a hell of a lot more than I did, and you just left him where he was, even though I bet you knew more than you're letting on." Conner stood up from the couch, and okay. So he felt like a ninety pound weakling standing in front of Clark, but a man had to stand on his own two feet. It was one of the first things he'd ever learned about life, and it stood him in pretty good stead.

"Do you honestly believe I could leave someone in a situation like that?" Maybe subconsciously, he could. Maybe. Because he'd had a lot of near misses if that was true.

"I honestly believe that you were busy. And that when it comes to Luthor, sometimes it takes you a couple of weeks to get into the right headspace, so maybe I just think that you weren't thinking." Clark was still standing there, all forbidding and shit, and seriously, never growing up to be all that totally sucked. "And I think that before, I was curious. Curious what Luthor had made. Now I'm curious what Luthor was before he turned into Luthor, because Alex doesn't seem like that bad of a guy to me."

"It's there, though. It's just waiting." Yeah, well, something was waiting, and whatever it was needed tons of fucking therapy. Tons. Torture, sex therapy, all sorts of shit Conner couldn't even get his head around. He needed to start a businessman hit list.

Yeah. That sounded like a good place to start. "J'onn's coming this afternoon. Talk to me after that. You know, it's kind of funny. I've never seen you so willing to write off somebody who might need saving." Maybe it disappointed him.

"I tried to save him." Clark's jaw was hard, set, maybe even clenched. "I tried and I tried and I tried, Conner. He's evil the same way some people just can't stop an addiction long enough to get their lives together."

God. He didn't get it. He didn't understand that Conner maybe needed not to be the only never-aging sixteen year old on the planet. So what if Alex was probably closer to twenty? "You can't know that things are going to be the same. You can't know how everything might have changed for him already, including what happened between him coming out of whatever tube they cooked him up in and now. It's not like I asked him to marry me." He was good-looking, yeah, and Conner had a fantastic appreciation for hotness, but he was also damaged. There were a lot of things Conner had never lived through, so he couldn't know how Alex felt.

Who he was.

Who he would be.

What he did know was that he had to give both of them the opportunity to find out those things. It didn't matter if Clark didn't have an interest in it. Might work better if he didn't, Conner didn't know.

"Every time someone hurt Luthor, he came back stronger and harder for it. He got worse. You would think it might've made him reflect on things, but he just... got worse. Every time." Now he was going to have to go digging into Lex Luthor's way back past to work out what memory bits Alex might've gotten. Or maybe just leave well enough alone.

Sometimes, he thought that was the problem. Kal was Clark and Clark was a nosy bastard by nature. It was the whole reporter thing. "Look. Maybe I should repeat myself. I'm not proposing."

"You're arguing that you want to keep him around. So he can become another menace," Clark countered and wow, that was simplistic of him.

"I'm arguing that if we keep him around, then maybe he'll become something else altogether. You think that whole 'let me give you another head injury instead of, you know, letting you know this place is crazy' thing probably didn't cause some of that?" Hell. "There's no point digging up old crap. Just... you left him where he was. You didn't find him in time for anything. At the very least, I think maybe one of us owes him something, and better me than you."

"I don't want you to go through what I went through, Conner." Except for the farm life, and the high school thing, which he was apparently going to go through forever.

"You're not my dad, Clark." Conner said it quietly. "I'm your clone. And in some ways, we're gonna be alike. But sometimes I'm gonna have to make decisions on my own and you won't like them. I think this is just one of those things."

Clark stood taller, if that was possible. "You're going to end up hurt."

He had to know how intimidating that was. "Then that's on my head, not yours. I'm never going to grow up, but... I still have to sometime. And I don't think I'm wrong about this."

"I'm sorry, but I think you'll find you are. I hope you don't wait until it's too late to work it out." It would've been a great time for Clark to just fly off, after that, except he didn't make it easy and do that.

"Maybe that's true. Maybe he's gonna turn out to be the biggest evil since Metropolis was a village." Conner paused. "And maybe he'll turn out to be a screwed up guy we saved from being raped and tortured. We'll just have to wait and see."

There was that jaw clench again, a definite anger tell that time. "I'm not going to clean up this mess for you, Conner."

Sometimes, he wondered if Clark's skull was made out of diamonds, he was so hardheaded. "I'm not asking you to, and believe me. If I need something cleaned up, you'll be on speed dial not at all."

"Fine. As long as we've established that. He's not going to be my responsibility." That had worked great the last time, so maybe Clark absolving himself was for the best.

Conner notched up his chin, giving Clark the same look right back. "No. He'll be mine, and I'll take care of things." Maybe he'd even get it right where Clark had screwed it up.

That was his goal in life, generally, to get it right where Clark had screwed it up, because Clark didn't have any investment in getting his screw-ups right. "I'm sorry you're going to do this to yourself."

He was sorry Clark thought that being a self-righteous dick was going to keep him from making the effort. Seriously, he thought the frowning Superman thing would work? "What can I say? Apparently, I like making my own choices like that." Conner hadn't always had other people to fall back on. He'd made some bad choices in his life, but they were his choices. This was, too, start to finish.

"That's fine. I'm..." Clark sighed. "Going home. If you need me, you know how to find me." Because the frowning Superman thing wasn't going to work.

At least he got that. Maybe that meant he'd manage to scrape together half an hour's nap before heading back to the hospital. "I won't need to, but... thanks."

"Good luck." And it wasn't completely sarcastic, before Clark blurred out of the room, slower than Bart but he was probably already in the house saying his goodbyes to his parents.

With a groan, Conner flopped down on the old couch, hearing it groan beneath his weight. It took a minute to set the alarm on his cell for forty-five minutes, and he closed his eyes, still stewing. Catching a little sleep wouldn't hurt any, or at least he hoped not.

* * *

  
If there was one thing Lex was sure of, it was that he didn't like people rummaging around in his mind. He disliked it very heatedly, and never wanted to feel that sensation again. Never mind that afterwards, the guy who'd probed through his head had told him nothing at all. Not so much as hello or goodbye, and in all seriousness, it would have made anyone nervous. He'd been big and green and angry-looking, and all he could think of was _The Incredible Hulk_. It hadn't been a comfortable thought, to say the least.

Still. The nurse who'd come in sometime after he'd left said they would discharge him, and so he'd waited, not knowing what to do with himself. He didn't have any clothes that he could find, and for once all of the people watching him seemed to have taken the day off. He would've made a run for it if he hadn't been afraid of someone hunting him down, if he wasn't unsure of who he was or where he was going if he did make a run for it, because so far it was Lex Luthor, zero; world, forty.

It shouldn't have startled him when the door came open, but it did. The fact that it was Clark -- intimidating, very big Clark, which was quite different from young, very big Clark -- made his pulse pick up, and not in a good way.

"Luthor." He hated that. That word, as if his last name was all that he was, as if nothing of him was Lex.

"Clark." He wasn't willing to quite try to use 'Kent' in the same way, because he liked the Kents. He found Clark's father interesting and challenging, and his mother familiar and warming and Conner was at least... calm.

There was a lot to be said for calm.

Lex watched Clark lean back against the wall beside the door, arms crossed over his chest. "I hear they're going to be letting you go."

"Yes. Apparently I'm as healthy as a horse for someone whose throat was just cut." Which always struck him as the oddest idiom, because he knew how flimsy and strange horses were when it came to health. It was a horrifying comparison with that knowledge in hand.

For a moment, he thought he saw something vaguely human flit across Clark's face, but it was gone to quickly to tell. "Conner's made some decisions about you. I don't agree with them." He paused, gaze narrowing. "But I'm going to let him make them. For your own sake, don't make me regret that."

He dropped his head to his hand, considering that sort of bizarre, stretched thin hatred for a moment. "I don't... I have no idea how I ever made you so angry, Clark."

"Look it up. I feel sure you've managed to fund this little time-travel trip into your past, and that it won't be any problem for you to find out. Or anything else you might want." He was terrifyingly grim, and Lex didn't want to look at him. He'd learned not to look at people who glared at him with that expression, and it made him sick to think of doing it.

"I have no idea what you're talking about." And yet Clark was so angry when he'd been Lex's friend what felt like not long ago at all. Guilt and sorrow and nausea were mixed together, and he didn't know what to do about that.

Clark stood up straight and reached for the door handle. "You will."

"How? I don't know what I was thinking when whatever happened to you happened!" He snapped it, and wanted to leave right then, but Clark was still in the door, and he just wanted him gone.

That smile wasn't Clark at all. It was some grim, alien thing, and it scared him. "Don't worry. I'm sure it'll all come back, and if you make him regret helping you?" The door opened. "Don't think I won't make you sorry for it."

"Go away." That was all he could manage, because none of it was making any sense. "Go away. Just..."

"Lex?" It was Conner, coming in from the hall, Luthor eyes looking at him, bruise-blue and suspicious, shifting to glare at Clark. "Do you need me to....?"

"I think he was just leaving." If not, hopefully Clark would take that as a damn hint that their conversation wasn't going anywhere.

Leaving, and gone, probably in order to keep up appearances. All of the nurses had seemed to know who Conner was, and clearly the Smallville hospital staff would know all of the Kents and then some. "Are you okay?" It was a similar sort of earnest concern, the kind he remembered from Clark. For all that Lex recognized bits of himself, his eyes, maybe the shape of his mouth, he looked too much like Clark.

Not that it was a bad thing, but Clark was cold now, and that was strange. "Yeah. They said I could go soon." Go where... was a different question.

At least Conner was nice. Easy, like he understood, even if Lex didn't understand anything at all. "Yeah. Miz Lorraine said so at the front desk, so I went back out to the truck to get the bag Aunt Martha put together for you. She said she wants you back at the house, at least long enough to feed you for a while." He gave a half-smile. "There are cookies in there, too. I didn't even eat any of them."

"Martha sent cookies." And Martha had known him back then, so why didn't she hate him like Clark? "What did J'onn say?"

"That you're not Luthor. Not yet, anyway, was more or less his take on it, but I don't think you're going to be." He moved to sit in the chair by Lex's bed, dropping the bag at the foot of it. "After all, I'm not Clark. Nothing's set in stone unless somebody's there to make sure it is, and I'm going to be here to make sure it's not. If that makes any sense."

Not yet, anyway. "So, I. I am him, a little? I mean, these memories..." He just had to know, because it was context, and he didn't have that.

"Yeah. You're him. I mean, genetically, you're mostly him. There are dashes of other things in there, Tim says, something that bolsters the effects of early exposure to kryptonite. Makes you heal fast and easy and clean. And apparently Luthor managed to upload a certain amount of himself. Personality, memories. Clark thinks he died before he finished." Conner was looking at him again, like he could see through him. "I think he finished just the way he wanted. Gave himself, gave you, the chance to be something else. Somebody new. I don't know what the significance was, because I don't know a lot. Clark doesn't talk about it, and Aunt Martha and Uncle Jonathan just look worried a lot."

Fresh start. Fresh start with Clark just having saved him and Smallville so full of potential, so far removed from whatever had happened... "Clark thinks I'll... do whatever I did. That I'll re-offend."

"I think I already said Clark can be kind of a suspicious asshole. Me, I've got a little more faith in the world." He grinned, but it faded. "Maybe I'm just too new out of the tube to have lost that, but... you and me, we're gonna be around a while. I think I'd like to keep that faith. How about you?"

"I don't know. I went to sleep in Smallville, and woke up with Morgan Edge..." Lex waved a hand a little, because he couldn't quite finish that sentence or effectively dismiss the thought that went with it. "And then it got worse. And I don't... know what there is to do. I don't have the goals I had."

Conner shrugged. "All I can tell you is maybe I can help you look for new ones." He glanced away before he spoke again. "Everybody needs a goal in life. Sometimes things get rearranged, the world turns upside down. There's not much to do except keep going." He licked his lips. "You probably can't die. You probably won't age. That's pretty much you and me, there together, at least for that part. Hopefully, we'll get along because if we turn out like them, I think maybe we could take the world apart between us."

He grimaced a little, looking towards the door. "Like myself and Clark, you mean. What did I do?"

"Oh. Lots of stuff. You tried to take over the world pretty regularly, and when you weren't busy with that you developed weapons to try and kill him. But hey, if it's any consolation, I think it's probably because you guys are kind of all-or-nothing, and there was a lot of head trauma." That was either the most earnest answer he'd ever gotten or the most bizarre. Maybe it was both.

In the same one. "I tried to take over the world?" That seemed unbelievable.

Dark brows pulled together. "Well. Yeah. More or less. And you're not the first clone, but you're not like the other ones, either. The ones I met always had full memories. Oh. And you were -- he was? -- president."

"There've been other clones?" And he'd been president. How the hell was he supposed to function in a world where he looked like the crazy person who'd been president?

The way Conner nodded was a little reluctant. "Yeah. But not the same as you. You're different. And I kind of wonder...." He paused, licked his lips. "I really have no idea, but the thing you need to keep in mind is that you're different. He didn't give you the full memory set, according to J'onn. He stopped here, with Smallville."

"Smallville was supposed to be a fresh start. I was trying to get away from my father, from who I was, and..." Maybe that was the point.

Maybe that was why he, Luthor, had stopped there.

Maybe a lot of things. It gave him a headache, made him tired just thinking about it. "So why not let it be?"

"Are there any other Luthor clones alive right now?" He assumed not. And the original was dead, which meant he'd probably intended Lex... to be it.

Somehow, he didn't feel grateful.

"So far as I know, you're it. You probably ought to get dressed before the nurses come looking to see if you're ready to go. We can stop and get coffee on our way back to the farm if you want. Aunt Martha's cooking, or I'd offer whatever else you wanted, but I think she's kind of worried you'll be upset to be living at the farm." Conner's mouth twitched. "I, uh. I'm not always that great with the whole farm thing. I miss Metropolis."

"Do I still have the castle?" It was a curious question. Coffee sounded very good, and just. Calm. Calm sounded good. So Lex stood up, reaching for the bag to take it into the bathroom to change.

Conner shifted, moving to close the blinds that led out to the rest of the hospital. "I guess. I haven't exactly looked into your current holdings. I was a lot more interested in where you came from and why than in what you had."

"That's all right. I still know how to find information. Just because I'm... twenty, thirty years left of where I thought I was doesn't mean the world's changed so much." It was halfway, almost a question as he pulled out a pair of pants.

"Yeah, about that." The other young man was steadfastly watching the closed blinds, as if saying it was okay to change there, that he wouldn't look. Lex wasn't sure he believed it, although he could admit to himself that he felt stupidly safer whenever Conner was near. "You'll have to see some of it to believe it, but I've got a laptop back at the farm. You can probably figure it out from there."

"Okay." He waited until Conner was looking away again, and slid out of the hospital scrub pants he'd been wearing, pulling on underwear first.

It didn't take him long to dress, although the clothing itself made him itch a little. There was a reason that he preferred silk and angora to wool, and denim wasn't exactly high on his list of favorites. Still, the t-shirt was cotton, and soft enough that it didn't make him cringe, even if the symbol on it looked remarkably like the breastplate of Alexander the Great. Well, that or a weird kind of S, either way.

"Strange design," Lex murmured, because he was at least dressed that much and if Conner turned around it wasn't a problem.

The statement was clearly viewed as a prompt, because he turned around and promptly blushed just as much as Clark had on occasion. One hand rose to rub the back of his head sheepishly. "Yeah, uh. Sorry about that, I have no idea what I was thinking. I should have got something else, right?"

"It looks like the breast plate of Alexander the Great, back in the Metropolis Museum." Lex pulled at the fabric again, and started to buckle the belt from the bag.

"Funny. I don't think I've seen that. Nah, it stands for Superman. Well. Most of the time. Which is this whole weird play on Nietzsche that I'm not sure I feel comfortable contemplating, in all honesty." Conner pulled a pair of socks and shoes out of the bag and set them on the bed beside Lex. "Because some things are just a little weird even for me."

"Nietzsche had better concepts, I think. Of course humanity should have goals for itself, but to tie the concept to one man rather than collectively is absurd. Also _Sprach Zarathustra_ is overexposed." He sat on the bed, and pulled socks on carefully, a little confused that everything seemed to be in perfect, pain free order. Who had known all of the right sizes, and why did this seem far too easy?

Zipping the bag, Conner tossed it over his shoulder. "Whatever you say. That's more Clark's territory than mine. I usually fall asleep in English class, whether it's American lit or world lit. You ready? They'll make you sit in a wheelchair but once we get to the lobby, we're home free."

"I'm ready. What do you like to study?" That seemed the right ground to start out on, because he knew things, felt things, remembered things, but Conner wasn't Clark and he needed to start over. It was strangely like being in free fall somehow, out of touch and in touch all at the same time.

"Honestly? I can't say I'm all that crazy about school. Most of its boring, and calculus is a special kind of torture. I mean, I remember all of the formulas, but putting them in context gets rough sometimes." He reached over and touched the nurse call button, brushing past Lex just close enough that the air between them sparked. "Ow. Sorry."

"Air's a bit dry in here," Lex drawled, standing up. "How old are you?"

Conner looked at him. God, his own eyes looking back, he was going to have to get used to that. "Chronologically, how old people think I am, or how old I'll be for the rest of... well. Forever?"

"All of the above. I'm interested in the variety of answers." He needed to know all of it. He felt twenty-one, almost twenty-two, but if he went by how long he'd been out of a tube, or whatever he'd been grown in, that was going to be a different, much shorter answer.

The door to the hallway opened, cutting short their conversation. Conner stood up straight and smiled, tilting his head. "We're ready to go, I think. Aunt Martha's cooking. Apple pie and everything."

It didn't surprise Lex that the nurse smiled back at him; people had always smiled at Clark, too. "And nobody would miss Martha Kent's apple pie. Climb in, Alex, and we'll take you downstairs."

"Thanks." He smiled at her, shifting to sit in the wheelchair and glancing at the little name tag on her top. Alice. "This always feels a little funny to me, but I understand liability being what it is."

Conner hitched the bag on his shoulder again and moved to hold open the door so he could be pushed through it. "Yeah, well, Mr. O'Farrell still walks out on his own, but who's gonna tell him no?"

"Who's Mr. O'Farrell?" He didn't know, and he might as well learn the color of Smallville. That had been part of his original plan. Maybe Mr. O'Farrell had been living in Smallville then, too.

"Oh, they've got a farm on the other side of the county. He's kind of old-fashioned and the idea of anybody pushing him around in a wheelchair makes him a little upset." The nurse was cheerful, pausing to push the button and call the elevator. "He's terribly sweet, other than that."

"Huh." Because what did one say to that? He was sure his father was fine with it for the sole purpose of PR.

And his father was dead.

Realizations like that gave him a jolt, made him shudder with the force of his strange new reality closing in on him. His father was dead, he wasn't himself, and Conner wasn't Clark. It almost made him grateful for the wheelchair even as Alice quickly turned him around and backed both of them into the elevator, Conner holding the door to prevent it from closing on them.

"Some people are just old-fashioned." Like Clark, maybe, although Lex wasn't sure he really knew exactly what that was supposed to mean.

"It probably works for some people." Conner didn't seem old fashioned, and maybe that had been the problem with Clark through the years. Not able or willing to change? He wasn't sure. The fact that he felt something like hope mixed in with all of the dread and general fear probably just meant he needed to see a psychiatrist, although that just made him kind of sick to consider.

The elevator chimed and the doors opened, leading out into a lobby filled with stained glass windows and people passing through. Nobody took a second look at him, and that was strange. Weird, but kind of nice, too. "Hey, Alice, thanks. If you don't mind, we can make it from here. Promise." Conner had that Clark smile down pat, too.

It worked wonders on adults, people in general, and it worked wonders for Conner, because Alice nodded, and patted Lex's shoulder faintly. "All right. Have a safe trip home."

Home. Not that he had a home, but Conner was volunteering and he felt safe, so that was going to have to serve for 'home' for the moment. He'd work out what belonged to him, what to do about the castle, what to do about... well. Everything. Later.

For the moment, he got out of the wheelchair and let Conner put a hand on his elbow, gently guiding him through the hospital and out the door to a beat up farm truck that was probably older than both of them. How old they were supposed to be, anyway, and that reminded him that he still didn't have an answer to the question of Conner's age. Just because he hadn't gotten an answer didn't mean he was going to leave that alone. He waited until he'd climbed up into the truck and Conner had joined him on the other side before he asked it again, which seemed very much like patience. "So, you were telling me how old you are."

The key slid into the ignition smoothly and the truth cranked after a couple of pats of the gas pedal. "Well. People in Smallville think I'm eighteen. I'm actually only a little over two since being decanted, and I don't age. I can't be sure if I'm really immortal or not, but I think if I'm not, it must be kind of close. So... I'll be sixteen forever." For always, and he carefully didn't look at Lex when he said that. "You look a little older. Twenty maybe. That'd be nice."

"You don't look sixteen." It was an odd blurt, something that he felt would've better belonged in a night club, with all of the implications that would go with it there. Not sitting on a bench seat in an old truck that he remembered Clark driving when he'd known Clark.

It got him a wicked grin, one that didn't look anything like he'd ever seen on that face before. "Yeah, well, I've seen pictures of Clark at fifteen, Alex. He looked twenty, so at least I've got that little bit of genetics to be grateful for, right?"

"You can pass for not jailbait." Lex leaned back in the bench seat, eyeing the roads. Things seemed definitely... different. Not vastly remade, but certainly left of right. "So when do you 'finish school'?"

"End of May, give or take. Another three months, more or less. Gotta tell you, it feels more like three or four years. Seriously, what use is calculus gonna be to me, anyway?" A glance darted his way. "Tell me you don't use calculus every day."

"Actually, I do. _I_ do. Did." There was a use to it, a point, when one was building, it was basic math for the harder things one ran into in application.

Conner groaned as he pulled out onto the street. "Yeah. Remind me not to ask that question again in public, at least not when I'm complaining about how much I hate it. Or maybe it's just that it's boring. I could be out saving the world or something instead."

"But you'd need tools to do that, wouldn't you? Equipment, you'd need..." To save the world. He needed support to save the world, and oh. Conner was like Clark, Superman? Clark was Superman? It all just clicked in his head at once, bits of conversation and suggestions. He didn't remember anything between the explosion and the hospital, but clearly Conner was assuming that he did.

He glanced over, saw that thoughtful frown. "Wow. Uh. Well, no, not really. I mean there are other guys with equipment but mostly I just..." Conner shrugged. "I'd have to show you. It's not the same as Clark. It's different."

"I hit Clark with my car that day on the bridge, didn't I?" He'd really hit him, plowed him through the guard rail, and Clark had still been in good enough shape to pull the roof off in order to save him.

"You did what?" That seemed to startled him. "Seriously, I'm going to be spending the rest of next week delving into old newspaper records to figure out what went on back then, yeah?"

He rubbed at the bridge of his nose, because his sinuses felt oddly tight. "I might be joining you there. I hit Clark with my car when I came into town. I swore I did, and he said that it was impossible, that he was walking home and saw my car take out the guardrail. He jumped into the river to pull me out."

"Saving kittens, old ladies, and bald billionaires," Conner muttered, slowing the truck. "Do you want coffee or just to go ahead and head back to the farm? I figure Aunt Martha probably has some but she's also most likely frying chicken right now, so."

"Coffee. I've probably never had a good cup of coffee in this body." He'd had a lot of misery and a lot of pain, and he'd even drank his own piss. There wasn't any reason for Lex Luthor to say no to good experiences.

That got him a laugh. "Well, now see, I think that's a mortal sin." He parallel parked neatly by pulling straight through one open parking space and up into another. "C'mon. The Talon looks like a reject from a bad forties Egyptian movie, but the coffee's really good. You'll like it."

"How long's the Talon been in business?" It actually looked like a repurposed movie theater, which Lex was going to put down as 'interesting'. Historic building, possibly.

"Dunno. Since Clark was in high school, I think. Mrs. Ross ran it for a long time. She still owns it, just Elizabeth Miller's been running it the last little while. The coffee's still good, even if the pie doesn't come up to scratch on the days that Aunt Martha doesn't deliver. But the double chocolate muffins?" Conner hummed, pushing open the driver side door. "They're awesome."

"Okay." He popped his own door open, and eased down carefully. "I'll take your word for it. Who's Elizabeth Miller?"

"I think her dad used to be sheriff a couple of decades ago. It's one of those things Clark refuses to talk about, and I refuse to look up on the grounds that it'd probably just tell me bad things, and there are enough tragedies in the world that I don't want to deal with all the ones here in Smallville." Conner moved around to Lex's side of the truck, standing close in a just-in-case manner. "Because let's be honest. It's almost like they're centered here, in a creepy, scary kind of way."

"And it's never really occurred to you to look back and see what happened to set that standard? Is it still like that?" Lex seemed to remember that a lot went wrong in Smallville. It was just the way the place was.

Dark brows arched upwards. "What, and spoil the surprise for myself? Are you kidding? C'mon. You want a hand?"

"No, I'm fine." Not used to moving and not used to Smallville, but he was fine. A little tense and surveying his surroundings, but at least he got out of the truck.

"Anyway. Yeah, the place is pretty much still kind of crazy. It's not that I'm not interested in the past so much as trying to keep up with all of the stuff that crops up in the present." He was watching Lex, leading the way a little ahead of him.

It was odd of him, but Lex wasn't going to protest as he walked after Conner. "So what's happened... most recently. As an example, if you can discuss it in public."

Conner's wry expression was very different from Clark's, night and day in some ways. "Not so much. I mean, it's common knowledge, but there are still things people don't talk about in public. Plus, Clark might have me gutted if I told all in front of God and Smallville."

"I think you're already on his gutting list." Lex left that alone, though, and followed him into the coffee shop. It smelled just like coffee shops should smell, according to some memory that wasn't really his.

"Yeah, well, you know. Luckily for me it's theoretically impossible. Hey, Anna. I didn't know you were working at the Talon." He ushered Lex towards a table, pushing out a seat for him before sliding in on the other side.

The girl was pretty, all dark eyes and creamy skin. Clark's type, if he was remembering right. "Just after school a couple of days a week. My mom got tired of me stressing over college applications and thought I should help out around here. What can I get you guys?" And her eyes clearly asked who his friend might be.

"Could I have a caramel macchiato and a couple of those double chocolate muffins? What kind of coffee for you, Alex?"

"Uh, caramel macchiato." He didn't even know if menus looked half like they had when he'd thought he was. They couldn't have changed that much, surely.

Anna scratched a few notes on her pad and grinned at them. "Kind of old-fashioned, but I think we can manage that. Need anything else?"

Conner dipped his head and looked at her. "Your phone number, gorgeous?"

That got him a laugh and a shake of her head, like she'd known that question was coming. "I'll be back in a minute. You're shameless, Conner." More shameless than Lex -- he felt that urge to flirt, to woo people, but it had taken a beating and he'd seen more of people's junk in the last two months than he'd ever wanted to see.

"Yeah, well. Shameless doesn't get me very far most of the time, but it's kind of fun." Conner was watching him, leaning in closer to the table. "Besides. If it worked as often as I tried it, I'd never get any sleep, and I would never have time to play Final Fantasy, either."

Lex leaned an elbow on the table, watching Conner. "So, what version are they up to, now? I remember ten. And twelve was in development."

"Seventeen's on its way any day now. I think you'll like it. If you're not too tired when we get back to the farm, we can give it a shot. Or we could play Doomsday but that one got old and kind of creepy in a hurry." He gave a broad shrug. "Plus, Aunt Martha really doesn't like that one. I get why."

"Doomsday?" He was missing a reference there, and he knew it, but. "Yeah, I... I've missed a lot, and we should start somewhere."

Conner tilted his head. "That one will take some explaining. Most of what I know is secondhand, so I expect you'll want to look up most of it. I'd probably explain it all wrong." And it was clearly something that made him a little uncomfortable, too. Lex wondered if it always had.

"We'll start with escapism first." Because he'd had enough of, of not escaping, of not being able to escape, to pass up the opportunity to relax for a few minutes, an hour or two.

"Good, then..."

Then there were muffins, and coffee. Talking about games hurt a lot less than talking about things that he didn't want to discuss, or the things that Conner was avoiding. At least he didn't lie outright, and maybe some things were better spoken of in private.

* * *

  
Fried chicken, biscuits, mashed potatoes, cream forties and corn on the cob. It didn't seem like a lot considering Conner was living with them now, and it seemed like too much at the same time. The apple pie smelled hot and crisp and delicious, and she was as nervous as a cat.

Lex Luther was back, only it wasn't Lex. Not really, but... "Martha." Jonathan startled her, made her set her fork down too hard.

"Oh, hi, sweetheart. I was just finishing up. I figured Conner would be a little late. That boy's less likely to be on time than Clark ever was, and that's saying something." She turned around and smiled at Jonathan. Forty years and she still loved him as much as the day she'd married him. "Maybe we should call."

"Maybe they stopped somewhere on the way home. Maybe they're talking." They, because he wasn't saying Lex's name, because he'd been on and off and unsure about him, but never really angry like Clark. Disappointed, and that hurt Martha as much as it surely hurt him.

Leaning in, she gave him a kiss. "Well, I expect they stopped for coffee. And muffins, knowing Conner. Hopefully he'll eat most of L... Alex's." That would take some getting used to, wouldn't it? "He's always just picked at things like a bird." Maybe she had cooked too much. It was just that she was so nervous.

It was so strange, sometimes, having Conner at home, all by itself. She loved him, but he was a very different young man than Clark had been at the time. Or maybe she was better equipped to handle a superpowered teenager the second time. "I don't think that'll stop anytime soon. The only thing the last one reliably finished off was coffee and liquor."

"Be nice, Jonathan. He was just a boy then, and he's just a boy now. Maybe if we treat him like one, things will change." The oven beeped, and Martha turned to reach for her mitts.

"I don't think this one has as much of a chance at acting his age as the last one did." Jonathan settled at the kitchen table, but she knew in a couple of moments he'd be up to at least get out glasses.

The pie was perfect, and she settled it carefully on a rack near the sink to cool. "Well. I don't know where the boys found him, or how, but I know it wasn't good." They'd carefully talked around it, mostly in order to toss accusations. It hurt her to see Clark that way, but it had hurt her to see Lex as what he'd become as well. "And I think, I hope, that Conner at least is a little less... idealistic than Clark was. It's been a long time, Jonathan, and I know you were always suspicious of Lex, but maybe. Maybe we can change things. Maybe it doesn't have to turn out badly."

"No, maybe it doesn't." She could hear Jonathan getting up to get glasses down. "And I'll give him a chance. It took time for Lex to become what he did."

"Time and a lot of people against him, including us sometimes. I just don't... I want for things to go better this time, and I'm worried that Clark will take this even worse than it seems like he's taking it and...." Martha sighed.

"Martha." He settled a hand on the back of her neck, starting to rub it. "We can't do anything except take it as it comes. I'm not going to let you worry yourself crazy before anything happens."

She was going to worry, but it didn't hurt to smile up at him. "I know. I'll try not to worry too much, I just hope we get it right. For all our sakes." Living the rest of her life afraid that Conner and this new Lex would end up fighting the way Clark and the old one had would be unpleasant to say the least.

"Well, we know what pitfalls to look out for. Hell, some of them are dead. Watch for Lionel Luthor, signs of growing megalomania, experiments in the barn..." The knock on the door, hard and unfamiliar, startled them both.

"Jon? Were you expecting anybody?" Nobody except the boys, and she hadn't heard the truck drive up. Besides, Conner would never knock.

"No." He edged past her, getting between her and the door and reaching slowly for the doorknob. She was tempted to start keeping a gun in the kitchen, and now she knew it was going to be too damn late if she needed to. Jonathan opened the door and just kind of stood there blinking. "Uh...."

Martha would have liked to say that she wasn't surprised when the pretty blonde stepped inside, hair plaited down her back. It made Jonathan take a step back, and frankly it scared her more than a little. This wasn't the first time she'd seen that face, or that kind of determination. "Lex Luthor. Where is he?"

"Ma'am, I don't know where he is. Why don't you--"

"We're going to find him," the woman behind her said firmly, closing the door behind them both. "And he's in town."

"I'm not sure what you...."

"Tell me where he is, and this won't get ugly. We aren't stupid. If he's missing, then this is the place we're supposed to come. He's supposed to be here."

"He's... look, just who are you?" Jonathan was asking that against common sense, while Martha was thinking hard about whether she could clock one of the women with something. There was a hot pie sitting by the sink after all.

Instead, she decided to step a little closer to her husband. "Coming in making demands isn't going to get you anywhere at this house." Especially if Clark was paying attention, and with Lex coming to live with them, it was a distinct possibility.

"We're here for Lex Luthor." To help or to hurt him, but Martha was sure that she knew those women. They were Lex's bodyguards, or had been. They were dead. Supposedly, and not that that meant anything.

The fact that she could dismiss mortality in that way should have been more disturbing, really. "He's...." A rattle and steady thrum announced it better than she could, drawing all attention to the window. "Jonathan. I don't think...."

What she thought didn't matter. The blonde -- Mercy, that was her name, and the other one was Hope, a strange sort of mockery it used to seem -- had already turned and was out the door and onto their porch, heading for the yard.

"I didn't miss this kind of crap, Martha!" Jonathan was out the door after them, striding along as if he could thwart them somehow. He couldn't, and if it was the boys, then Conner would be more likely to keep things from becoming overly violent.

She hoped, anyway.

* * *

  
Conner cursed, short and virulent, bringing the truck to a too-quick stop. "Shitfuck. Seriously, why is it nothing ever goes right? Stay here. Just... just stay here, okay?" He flung open the driver side door and got out, a little too fast, maybe, but not all that weird to Lex's eye. "Holy crap, Uncle Jon! Don't chase those crazy... ladies!"

"How am I just supposed to stay here?!" He started to get out, sliding over the seat towards the driver's side. At least if he got out, he'd be behind Conner. From the sound of things, that was probably the best place to be.

"You're supposed to... aw, hell." Hell, because they were both bearing down on Conner, Lex and the truck, and they didn't look happy to see pretty much anything at all.

"You." Like they knew Conner and they were pissed. Maybe it was somebody's attempt to take him back, to... he had no idea what.

"Yep, me. So, you know, if we could just go ahead and not fight and say we did, that would be totally awesome." He might not be apple-pie-perfect like Clark, but Lex was getting to like the strange earnestness. "I mean, you're really hot and all, so the getting up close and personal would be kind of amazing, but I'd hate to come between the two of you. Skipping it seems like a much better idea."

Crazy people ran at him, and Conner made a lesbian joke. That was an improvement on Clark in so many ways that depressed him, but Lex started towards Conner to... He wasn't sure. Hide, stay close to him, help.

"Conner, they're here for Lex!" Great. Jonathan Kent was probably inclined to hand him over, too.

"Well no kidding!" Conner yelled it, and then there was a rush of air over Lex's scalp, and it was a good thing that he didn't get motion sick.

The Earth had moved, or Lex had moved over the Earth, and for a moment the world spun. But it still startled them one when of the women shouted his name. "Lex! Follow the plan!" Which would've been great except there was no plan. There was nothing except him standing next to Martha Kent, drunk and kind of shocked.

"Or I'll come up with a better one." Two gorgeous women who clearly had a plan were after him. Ordinarily, he supposed he'd be flattered, but at the moment he was mostly worried. He could even admit to himself that he was a little scared, especially when the scariest one moved after Conner and the other one broke free and headed for the porch.

The porch was bad. He took a step backwards, except that was going to leave Martha Kent in front of him and he wasn't going to let her fight his fights. If this was his fight. "Look, what do you want? Money?"

The way she narrowed her eyes and hissed faintly wasn't good. "You don't know who we are, do you?"

Martha's hand was on his bicep, and he wasn't surprised somehow when he heard the sound of a shotgun being racked behind him. "I expect he isn't exactly who you think he is."

"I have no idea who you are." And he wondered if they'd think it was a ploy, but he honestly didn't. "But if you think you're here to help me, I... I don't know you. I don't need help. Not now."

"Mercy." The crack of her voice seemed as loud as the shotgun. It broke into some jibe about hot zombie chicks that was clearly about to get Conner's ass kicked if he wasn't so crazy-fast. "We've got a problem."

Jonathan's voice was hard when he spoke. "I'd say you've got more than one if she keeps that up."

"Shit. Mercy!" It seemed to startle the other woman, but Lex could tell that whatever they'd been expecting from him wasn't what they were getting.

And then Conner did it.

Holy cow. He was up, in the air, and Lex nearly let his jaw drop. Objectively, he'd known. He'd had some idea of it, of how they'd gotten him out, and Conner hadn't been shy about it for whatever reason, but knowing and seeing were totally different things.

"Sorry, hotness. Like I said, it's probably better if we don't keep this up."

The yell of frustration that got him echoed back off of the barn and then the blonde (Mercy, he told himself. What a name.) whirled and started towards the house. Apparently, shotguns didn't scare her nearly as much as they worried Lex.

Or the other woman.

"Stop it! I'm a guest here, and if you think you can help me, this is not how to do it!"

That seemed to bring her up short, as if direct orders from him were so ingrained she didn't even think before coming to a dead stop. "Lex."

"Wow. That was cool. Seriously, you couldn't have done that, like, three minutes ago?" And there was Conner, zipping under the porch roof to land beside him. "I'd heard she was good. Well, both of them. Scary, but good. Especially for dead people. Seriously, does nobody ever just stay dead anymore?"

"Conner!" Martha hissed it. "Be serious."

"Are they supposed to be dead?" They knew him, or he'd known them, before. When he'd been older, and possibly evil and at war with Clark Kent, and the thought seemed so surreal that it made his head hurt. "They don't look dead."

"And they don't look like pieces are about to fall off, either, but maybe Uncle Jon should aim for the head anyway." It was mostly under his breath. "So." Louder. "If you guys aren't, you know, zombie lesbians from Mars or whatever, how do you explain the whole not dead thing?"

The one with good sense gestured at Lex. "We were on a timed release." Oh god. Clones, more clones. They were clones of... whom?

"Who are you, though?"

A hiss escaped the blonde. "This. This is what comes of trusting that turning back time will fix things."

"He wanted to." The other woman still looked distraught, and watching Lex. Still, it was an improvement on the fighting with Conner and the Kents with a shotgun. "Shit. This wasn't in any of the plans."

"Then you should leave. Because I don't know who you are." Lex folded his arms over his chest, still watching them.

"I'm pretty sure I know who they are." Martha's voice was shaking. "Mercy Graves and Hope Gryme. They are. Were? Bodyguards."

Jonathan seemed kind of angry. "And criminals. And god only knows what else, so for now, I think you ladies need to get off of my property. Before...."

Of course he'd show up now. "Oh, crap."

Clark, in all of his tight spandex wearing glory, strange and foreign to Lex, all at the same time. "Before he shows up, I think Mr. Kent was going to say."

It startled Lex when Conner's hand touched his elbow. "C'mon. It's better if you go inside now. Superman's probably going to have a fight with your girls here, and he's kinda more serious about it than me."

"They were my bodyguards? How the hell did I need bodyguards?" If he'd been president, wouldn't they have been Secret Service, or did they make exceptions for evil people? But he moved when Conner moved and it was better to leave if he had that option.

The farmhouse door pushed open before they even reached it. "They are serious bad-ass bitches..."

"Conner!"

"...and I'll tell you all about Amazons and maybe we can talk about serious fantasy lives, because clearly you have an excellent thought process when it comes to these things."

"I can't imagine what I was thinking with two female bodyguards." There was the woman-on-woman implication and that... that was probably it. It left Lex wondering when he'd developed into a dirty old man kind of guy.

He wanted to look out the window, see what he could see. The noises were disturbing. "Yeah, well, they're kind of scary good. When I say Amazon, I'm not exactly joking." Conner winced as a particularly loud bang sounded. The back door opened and Jonathan came in, Martha immediately after him.

"Conner, get your uncle Jon's heart medicine, sweetheart, would you?"

"Dangit, Martha."

It was a shock to the system, hearing that. Seeing them and _looking_ at them, really looking, and seeing how they'd aged. In the flurry of action earlier, he hadn't truly seen them.

Lex pulled out a chair, not thinking, just doing. "Here, sit down. Do you need aspirin? Do... what can I do?"

"Here, Aunt Martha." A bottle was handed over, cap already off so that she could pull out the little spray dispenser. Jonathan sat heavily, and a little shuffle commenced with the medicine. Another harsh noise sounded, and Conner glanced at the window. "Maybe I should, uh...."

"Honey, they've been having fights for decades. Some things it's better not to get involved with. Jonathan, sweetheart? Is it helping?"

"If I wanted to start over, why would I have bodyguard clones?" He directed that at Conner, pulling at him a little. Whatever was going on out there, it was something that he didn't want his link to... to normality to get involved in.

Dark blue eyes glanced out the window, and Conner winced. "Uh. The other you, the Luthor you, he was sick. Maybe he missed something. Forgot some kind of vital clue. Or maybe he didn't know about them. Maybe it was something the bodyguards had set up, so that there would always be somebody there he could trust."

"Because coming here and attacking people is trustworthy?" It was assault, and Lex couldn't quite make the leap from what he was to what he'd become, even with everything that had happened to him.

Conner was looking at him, serious and steady now. "Maybe," he suggested, "they think that they're rescuing you. I mean. Hope said something about a plan, right? Maybe they were counting on you knowing it. Whatever it is."

He looked back at the Kents. "Well, they're a little too late for rescue."

The glance that passed between Martha and Jonathan was something he couldn't read. "Lex...."

"It's gotten quiet out there."

"Maybe they're all unconscious." He almost said 'killed each other' but Clark was still Martha and Jonathan's son. It was better not to say anything.

Conner straightened, shoulders going back. "I'll check in on them. Won't take a minute."

The only sound after that was the kitchen door shutting.

Lex stepped backwards, looking towards the Kents. "I suppose going out there will only make things worse." They seemed just as awkwardly uncertain as he felt.

Martha moved, then, nervous sort of motion. "Tell you what. Lex... no, no. Alex. Why don't you let me get you something to eat. Some pie or, or you'd probably like some chicken. I'm sure it'll all be okay."

Alex, like he was really someone different. "They're out there fighting because of me. What else is going to come here looking for me?"

And he knew. He'd known it before, but those two helpless faces.

He knew they were thinking the same thing.

* * *

  
Conner felt the twitch, hard. "Shit, man. That's just. Okay, it's hot, don't get me wrong or anything, I mean, I'm all for bondage and all, but I don't think they like it that much. Especially the... yeah, her name's Mercy, right?" He leaned a little closer. "You're hot, but you're really kind of scary."

"I'm going to rip your fucking eyes out!" Oh yeah, antagonizing that chick wasn't a good call, but it was still so much fun.

"Mmm, and skull fuck me to death, but seriously. I got to him before you did, and..."

"Conner. Don't tell everything you know."

Yeah, yeah. "...and see, I'm just thinking that there's gotta be a reason for that. I mean, it was nearly two months since Alex -- not Luthor, you're not stupid, even if you're scary -- decanted. And the original you died. Internal injuries sustained trying to keep him safe. Not Luthor, because he was dying or already dead when it happened. So what that says to me is that it took a while of the original Mercy Graves and Hope Gryme being dead before somebody decanted you."

Clark just didn't seem to give a damn why, or if he did, it was malingering. "There was a plan."

"There's always a plan." Why was it that Superman seemed so scary crazy sometimes? Maybe it was just paranoia or something.

"So what was the plan? Because Alex. He's not Luthor. He only remembers up to coming to Smallville. The plan didn't come through." Conner knelt down. "So, you know, skull fucking me to death would be awesome, at least if you had a penis, which, right, I'm not looking under there, okay? But it'd be pointless. He doesn't know who you are, and you're kind of scaring the crap out of him."

It didn't surprise him that they both looked tired and tense, and maybe they wanted to fight him, but they weren't going to. "What happened to LeXCorp?"

"I'm pretty sure it got sucked into Wayne Enterprises. Do you know when your databases were last updated?" That would be good to know, especially if Clark would quit glowering and shit. "Could you, you know. Stop doing that? It's a miracle none of us have been set on fire yet."

"I think you should let me talk to them. We need to know exactly what's going on here...." And any second now he was just going to take off with them, Conner knew it.

Mercy looked like she wasn't going to answer, maybe, except there was a softening around her eyes. "Databases are two years out of date."

Clark was a really smart guy. He was, it was just that he had this blind spot about everything Luthor. It would be kind of bizarre except for the fact that Luthor and Superman had been archenemies for about ten times as long as Conner had been alive, chronologically speaking. "Okay. So there's a lot you were missing. It seems kind of weird to me that your boss would let your databases get that far behind. Even if he was dying of leukemia."

"Perhaps you need to admit that you don't have a boss any longer." Clark said that slowly, and it almost startled Conner. "What is 'the plan', though? If you're out of date..."

He probably wanted to see if they were planning to take over the world as a backup.

It wasn't surprising to Conner that Hope answered. "We were supposed to regroup at the mansion in Smallville. When Lex wasn't there, we figured we knew who was responsible. You might fool the rest of the world, Kent, and you might spend most of your time giving our boss," the word was stressed, sarcastic, "head injuries, but some stuff you don't just forget, Big Blue."

"Luthor is dead." Clark was grim and firm, and Conner wasn't sure what he wanted to do except maybe convince them to leave town.

"And here he is in Smallville, and we're two years out of date, and he doesn't know who we are," Mercy pointed out.

Well, at least she could take what she'd heard and recognize the truth. That was good. "More or less, yeah. I'm guessing that the whole Wayne Enterprises thing might explain the two year thing. Especially if Luthor was trying to keep your lab hidden. Uh. If we let you go, will you maybe try not to kill anybody?"

"We're programmed..." She trailed off, pulling a face at least briefly. "We can't help him if he doesn't want help, Hope."

Heavy sigh. "Yeah. I get that. But one way or another, we've got one job. Just one job, and it's taking care of him."

Conner started working on the ropes. "Well, you know. You could get another gig. Or you could stick around because he could probably use a bodyguard or two. Although if you guys could not be weird creepy stalkers and try to beat people up all the time? That would be great too."

"We'll adjust the plan," Mercy seemed to agree. They sounded flexible, which maybe meant that not everything would turn to hell. Not that anybody would know it, looking at Clark's face.

"I'm not sure either of you is capable of adjusting to a new non-criminal kind of plan."

Hope scoffed, rubbing her wrists. "Yeah, and I wasn't sure until your little boyfriend here that you were capable of being anything except a total asshole, either."

"...I'm not even sure whether I should be thanking you for the compliment or insulted." Conner frowned.

"Cousin?" Mercy stretched her shoulders, standing up. "We're not criminals."

Yeah. Clark totally wasn't going for that. "So, look. Alex is kinda fucked up now, and I don't think he's up to dealing with you guys. So uh. Why don't you head back to the... mansion, castle, that pile of rocks, whatever... and settle in until things get straightened out? You know. Get a job not bodyguarding. I have no idea."

Working that out was just going to have to be between the two of them.

"I'll be watching you," Clark threatened, like he was really capable of killing someone. Unless driving someone to dead crazy counted, and most days it didn't count for enough.

"Yeah, yeah. Don't worry. We'll be watching you back. And that Alex thing?" Mercy snorted. "That won't stick."

Eh. Conner kind of liked it.

"Go. And don't come back like this again, or I'll put you away for trespassing." Then they'd never see the light of day again, because they wouldn't hit a real court, all because they worked for a dead guy that Clark still hated.

And people thought he wanted to be the next Superman.

Kind of he did. After all, Superman was pretty awesome so long as Luthor stuff wasn't involved. Sometimes Conner wondered if there weren't weird psychic implants involved. "But there's a telephone. You know. If you're inclined."

Mercy glanced at Hope, then looked back at Conner, more or less ignoring Clark altogether. "Fine."

"Okay." Fine and Okay were better than 'no' and its cousin 'fuck no'. "We'll leave. We'll leave and you had better take care of Lex."

"Hey." His mouth twitched into a nervous smile. "I'm a Kent. Totally trustworthy, right?"

Oh. Yeah. That wasn't a good look. "We'll be watching." And Clark would be watching them watching him, and he'd be watching them watching him being watched and watching, and then it'd be a Jethro Tull song. It was a relief when Mercy started to lead the way to walking back across the fields.

"Dude. You'd think they'd at least take a car," he suggested, shoving his hands in his pants. "So. You back off to Metropolis or would you prefer to stick around and, you know. Scare the hell out of Alex a little more, maybe?"

"I'm not scaring 'the hell' out of him." But he probably wished he did. "I'll be back, but not tonight."

Well, thank goodness for small favors. "See you later, then. Thanks for the help, even if I didn't need it." It would've been fine without him, and now it was just slightly more stressful.

"Just keep an eye on them." And then it was up, up and away, and that left Conner with Aunt Martha, Uncle Jonathan, and Alex.

Seriously, he wasn't sure he had the patience for this on a long-term kind of scale.

Usually, it was just him and life going on, without the fifty tons of interference and guilt and confusion Clark brought. He turned to head into the house, grimacing and trying not to think too much yet.

There was plenty of time for that later.

* * *

  
Bad dreams.

Nightmares, if he was honest with himself. Screaming drenched in sweat horror when he slept, even if he woke with his jaw clenched so tightly shut to keep from making a sound that it made his head throb. It hadn't been so bad in the hospital. Maybe it was the fact that he'd been surrounded by people; nurses in and out all the time, Conner dozing in a chair beside him. There had been someone there. More specifically, Conner Kent, and for some bizarre reason, he felt safe when Conner was close. Maybe it was a leftover from those memories of Clark, maybe it was the echo of being saved by Conner, both of them all primary colors and wide, happy smiles. He didn't know.

He was so very tired.

He'd learned where the squeaky floor boards were, and started a slow decent down the stairs, holding onto the handrail. Lying in bed didn't help, not given that half of his nightmares involved beds. The maddening part of it was that there wasn't a scratch on him, not a scar, not a nick, nothing. It was like none of it had happened.

The only familiar mark on his body was the faint scar bisecting his upper lip and a handful of marks from childhood scrapes. It was creepy, in more ways than one, and he didn't know how to deal with that. Had he, other scary try-to-take-over-the-world him, done that on purpose? Was there something all that special about the scar on his ankle from falling down, or the split lip he'd gotten the night that his dad had decided to send him into exile in Smallville? There had to be for him to have kept them on his clone, but Lex wasn't sure of the why. Maybe he would in a few years, but then again. Conner had said he wouldn't age. Why would the him of before want never to age?

Immortality had a lot to say for it, he guessed. The gods had been big on it, but Lex had always thought living forever would have more downsides than anything else. Eventually, an immortal would have done everything, fucked everyone, and would probably go mad. The fact that he was starting out kind of crazy could in no way be interpreted as good. Here he was, scared to go back to sleep and making coffee in the middle of the night so that he could sneak out onto the porch and drink until he jittered so that he could make it through the next day.

His next day didn't really hold much to it. Part of him wanted to rediscover his lost empire -- because fuck, Lex Luthor had apparently raised and crushed more civilizations all by himself than weather patterns -- and the other part of him wanted to do nothing but hide until the world forgot who he might have been.

The coffee finished and he poured a cup before opening the refrigerator for creamer. The motion was automatic by now, and it didn't take long to snag a light jacket on his way out the door, still careful to move quietly.

At least it was scenic outside. Maybe he'd go up to the 'castle' and explore a little in the morning. If he went now, he was sure that with his luck the local deputies would stop him. Not to mention the fact that his two very scary bodyguards were living up there, and he was sure he didn't want to deal with them yet.

Instead of settling on the swing, he moved to lean an elbow on the porch railing and looked up. There was a light on in the barn, and that was unusual. Lex -- Alex, he reminded himself, the way he did half a dozen times a day -- had been up in the middle of the night a lot in the last few weeks. He'd never seen a light on in the barn at night. Conner slept like a dead thing. The fact that he was awake was curious, worth inspecting. He clung tight to his coffee cup for a moment, standing and watching before he could get the courage and the motion going to do it.

When he finally managed, it felt kind of like sleep walking. The moon was high overhead as he moved across the yard, careful across the dew-slick grass. The side door was open, and he walked through it, pausing at the bottom of the stairs to wipe his feet on the mat before he started up.

Surely Conner would've heard him, or at least that was what he was expecting. He wasn't expecting the bloody footprints that started halfway up, like that was when he stopped using superspeed or flight, and touched down on the stairs. His pulse picked up before he hurried more quickly up the way.

"Shit, would you.... That _hurts_!"

"Don't be a big baby. It's not the end of the world. I've had worse."

"Yeah, well, you people are all crazy."

"Yeah, well, you're supposed to be all telekinetically invulnerable, so I wasn't expecting to sew something up tonight. Quit whining."

He could see Conner's head, dropped back against the sofa. "If you guys would just kill that bastard or at least lock him up someplace rock solid instead of someplace as useless as Arkham, we wouldn't have these nights."

"What happened?" He stayed at the top of the stairs, just watching, seeing the back of Conner's head and the top of Tim's. Tim was a bit of a fixture. It should have been strange, considering how far they were from Gotham, but it was a fact of life.

"Well shit." Conner dropped his head back. "Hey, Alex. Sorry. We're kinda messed up. Don't... you know, don't come over. You don't wanna see."

He heard Tim snort. "Seriously, he's a whiny crybaby shitass. It's only a couple of stitches."

"And it hurts!" Conner protested.

Being told he didn't want to see it wasn't actually a functioning deterrent for Lex, so he stepped forward, still holding his coffee cup. "What happened?"

A hiss and a virulent curse sounded almost simultaneously. "That crazy green-haired bastard they call the Joker. Tell me why I ever go to Gotham? Like, at all?"

"Joker is... not familiar," Lex said after a moment of watching him from behind, before he started to circle to see Conner head on. Tim was kneeling at his feet, and there was blood on him, too, though he wasn't sure whether it was from Conner or from Tim himself.

"See? You have to get the man up to speed before you tell him this stuff. Also, is it weird to you that we're confessing all of this stuff to him?" Tim frowned, tying off the knot. "Except you more or less spilled everything already, so there wasn't any point in lying about it. It'd just make us all look crazy."

Conner scowled. "Yeah, well, Clark lied a lot the first go round. I figured maybe we'd try it another way this time. Are you done yet? Because that really hurt, you bastard." He hissed tightly when Tim tipped the bottle of alcohol over the sewn cut. "Fuck!"

"What happened?" Lex leaned in, because 'the joker' wasn't any kind of answer except crazy, and maybe that was the point of it. Maybe he needed to start showing an interest in the world around him more, so he'd ask less stupid questions.

"Hyenas, and a crazy bitch in a harlequin costume. And also some things kind of blew up." A second tray with scissors and a threaded needle sat beside the one that was already opened, and he tried not to jump much when it started unwrapping itself. "So now, basically, it's Tim's turn not to be a whiny baby. Also, I'm pretty sure he's already had his rabies shots. What are you doing awake, anyway?"

"I have trouble sleeping." He didn't need to call it nightmares outright for it to be understood, he hoped. "Anything I can do?"

Conner grinned up at him. "There's some distilled water over there, and one of those plastic hospital pans Aunt Martha uses for peas. You could help us clean up. Then I'll get the mess we probably left on the stairs."

The tray might have been able to unwrap, but clearly the needle wasn't going to weave itself in and out. "Maybe he'd be better at the sewing than you," Tim muttered, eyeing Conner as he reached for the thing.

"The footprints are interesting," Lex commented, going to get the distilled water and the pan. He left his coffee mug sitting on a railing, abandoned.

"Yeah, and I don't want Uncle Jonathan to have a heart attack first thing in the morning. I wish I knew if Clark ever had nights like this."

Tim's voice sounded like it was being ground out through his teeth. It probably was. "You could always ask."

A snort. "Yeah, and get a six hour lecture on how he would never worry his folks like this. No, thanks. You okay?"

"I hate you."

"So, hyenas?" He halfway thought they were shitting him just to piss him off, but they were so very serious on it.

"Yeah. The Joker thinks they're funny. But then, he thinks blowing stuff up is funny, too, so clearly his sense of humor cannot be accounted for. Ow!"

Conner shook his head. "So who's the whiny crybaby now?"

"At least you're usually invulnerable."

"Usually which means occasionally fails when I'm spending so much time trying to save your ass. There."

Lex offered them the pan. "High school students by day, superheroes by night. And not to disparage anyone, but your guardians thought it was a good idea?" Oh. He recognized that look. "Right."

Conner glanced at him apologetically. "Well, Clark and I aren't not-talking so much as not-talking as some kind of Olympic sport. And the Bat never approves of much of anything. I think he was born that way or something."

"Who's the Bat? I think I need a wiring diagram to get all of this straight." He knew Conner and Tim, and what Clark had grown up to be, and the alien who'd probed his mind, and it stopped there.

That got the two of them exchanging looks, and then Conner looked back at him. "That one.... isn't exactly my secret to spill. But he likes to call the shots in Gotham. And he's kind of a bossy bastard. He was on your trail when we busted you out."

"Why was _he_ looking for me?" Why were any of them looking for him was still a question writ large, except Conner, at least, made sense. If nothing else, Conner needed someone to lean over his shoulder and help with his math homework. None of the rest of it made sense.

"Suspicion." Tim was honest about it. "I mean, we were the ones who found the other older you dead in a lab in Gotham. Once he figured out Superman hadn't found you yet, he was suspicious enough to hunt you down."

Conner was watching him, now, hands still. "Try not to take either of those things badly. Okay, so, Clark is a suspicious ass, and the Bat is so paranoid he practically jitters, but... I'll always come looking for you. Okay?"

Maybe okay. Possibly okay. Lex let his eyes drift down to the poorly stitched bite mark on Conner's side. It really looked more like a tear, and he'd never thought he'd see hyena bite wounds. "Tell me you disinfected that first."

Tim grinned at him. "You missed all of his whining about that earlier. Probably should have done it more than once, though. You almost done?"

Conner grunted and cut the suture from the needle.

"How often do you end up back here doing this?"

"Not that often. Well, it's not usually Conner doing the bleeding, anyway. Most of the time we're not even working together these days, which is kind of a long story. Usually somebody else is sewing me up." He pulled up his shirt, showing off several scary as hell scars.

"Somebody with more practice than me. Clench your teeth." Yeah, and there was the rubbing alcohol. Fuck that had to burn. He knew it burned, personal experience knew, but it was another thread of thought he couldn't place, and it was easier to watch Conner and then turn a little and try to work out where to start with the blood on the floor.

"Yeah. I think you'll live. You might wanna get a tetanus shot, just in case." Conner stood up and shook his head. "What a mess."

"Are you sure no one needs an infusion? IV bag?" They needed a mop, to start. At three in the morning, to clean the blood off the floor.

Christ. No wonder he had nightmares. Maybe this was one.

"Nah." Tim seemed pretty sure about it. "Neither of us is going anyplace else tonight, and if it's desperate enough, I'll call Dick." Dick. Dick Grayson, right.

Dick, Bruce's... whatever. Whatever, adopted something, ward, and it made Lex think for a moment, setting the bowl down on the coffee table. Bruce. Bruce was the Bat, wasn't he? Except that was insane. "I'll go back to the house, get you something to eat." He really couldn't face mopping the blood off the floor.

"Hey." Conner's face softened kind of, easy. "That'd be great. Sandwiches, and maybe some coffee. Don't worry about any of this, I'll get it taken care of before you get back."

Fuck. "Yeah. Thanks, I'll be right back." The coffee was already made, fresh and he was trying hard not to think while he started down the stairs again, because he could think, he could remember things, and why did blood stir up memories he didn't remember having?

It was hard to slip back down the stairs, past the blood, and he definitely didn't want any of whatever he took back to those two. Just thinking about the coffee made him queasy, and he had to pause under the moon, take a few deep breaths. Just for a minute, because otherwise he was going to vomit. Maybe he was going to do that anyway.

He could at least keep calm seeming in front of others, which was good. Lex was sure he wasn't fooling anyone, but it was at least good to keep up the facade. Then he saw the shadow of the barn roof shift, move just a moment, and he spun around in panic.

"Lex Luthor." That voice was so deep, dark as the shadow hovering there, sharp ears blotting out the moon. Taller than him, a hell of a lot broader than him, and the idea that this was Bruce fled him rapidly.

Twenty years had passed, and a lot had happened since then. "Who are you?" Other than one more asshole in spandex bothering him.

That seemed to make him puff up, so apparently he still had the touch. "How are they?"

They. "Conner and Tim, you mean. Suturing each other in the loft. You didn't answer my question." He was damned if he was going to cow down before some super-powered freak with pointy ears.

"Because you know the answer." Bruce could be such an asshole. He'd never stolen Lex's comic books or done anything overtly hateful just because he could, but that didn't change anything.

"Why are you here if it happened in Gotham?" And why was he on the roof? Bruce had always been a gymnast, but there was gymnast and taking up Cirque du Soleil as a pastime.

He didn't seem to be inclined to answer questions, either. "Clearly someone has to keep an eye on them. The last time they were out en masse, they blew up an entire house." He paused, tilted his crazy pointy-eared head. "And you?" As if it was some kind of social conversation.

"Couldn't sleep." Bruce on the roof. It wasn't going to sink in until daylight, except he'd missed Bruce. He'd half-loved Bruce before college, before Bruce had started to withdraw from all of them. Oh, he'd been social and he'd been involved in social activities, but he wasn't there anymore. Sometimes, Lex thought that was part of what had driven him to wilder and more inappropriate ways of having fun.

There was stretched silence between them for a long moment, and then a low sound. The grind of The Bat, or whatever, was different than Bruce speaking. "You're aware of a lot of secrets. You probably knew a number of them before. Don't make any plans to do something with them now." And then he was gone in a bizarre fluttery leather wing way.

He stood, staring for a moment, before he half-tripped and turned to head into the house. There were no words to explain that except that it was enough to inspire a man to try the worst with everyone expecting the worst of him. Had they been like that? Had they expected him to do bad things, or had he disappointed Clark and Bruce both so often that they couldn't expect anything better? It didn't make the night look up any, he could say that much.

Once inside the house, he flipped on the light over the kitchen sink and began to dig in the refrigerator. Turkey, lettuce, mustard, all shuffled onto the countertop. There was a loaf of bread on top of the microwave, and he grabbed that, too, digging quietly for silverware.

He stacked it together carefully, and just as noiselessly headed back out of the house again, easing the door shut behind him. It was madness. Maybe he needed to move away from all of them and go work someplace normal.

Someplace where there weren't footsteps in blood in the middle of the night.

Lex found himself flinching as he started up the steps, expecting to see them. There wasn't any sign, though; just scrubbed clean wood, and so he kept going until he reached the loft.

The bed was pulled out, the bloody bandages had gone the way of the dodo. Conner was alone, lying there, eyes half-closed. "Hey. Sorry. The Bat followed us. Showed up to get Tim. I figured you'd be back pretty soon. I feel kind of like crap so I didn't come get you. I should have, yeah?"

"When did Bruce Wayne transition from being an aloof moody asshole to an aloof moody asshole with bat-ears?" He set the pile of food on the coffee table, guessing that Conner was going to wolf it down.

"Dunno. Before I came along, anyway. You wanna sit down?" On the bed with him, and Conner squirmed up a bit, grimacing. "Crap. One of these days, I'm gonna manage to shield myself and the other guy all at once."

"You were actually bitten by a hyena." It still felt like a shock-statement to Lex and it was possibly proof that he needed more coffee than his stomach could handle. Except it wasn't really shocking. He was probably lucky he hadn't been fucked by one, after all. It probably was just a matter of time before he made it around the circuit to that guy.

"I hope they'd had their rabies shots." Conner made a face. "I'm gonna end up with Clark standing over me trying to jab me with needles, I figure. This is so going to suck." It didn't stop him from making sandwiches, though, and his hands looked clean. "You want one?"

Maybe. No. "Sure." He could at least nibble on it, staring hard at Conner's hands because he'd washed the blood off fast. "How do you even know these things are going on to go to them?"

Crooked half-smile, almost familiar. "Eh. There's somebody in Gotham who monitors pretty much everything, ever. Tim calls me now and then if he thinks I might be useful. Metropolis works a little differently. The older Clark gets, the less sleep he seems to need. So, you know. He keeps an ear out. My hearing's not as great as his, so I just tend to keep the police scanner on instead."

"Does this sort of thing spill over to Smallville often?" Maybe he just wasn't cut out for the superheroing business, picking up concepts from it in bits and pieces.

Conner handed over the first sandwich to Lex and smiled. "Not so much, but Smallville's always had its own issues. Everything changes, everything stays the same. Mostly, Clark wants me to stick it out here. Clean living or whatever, growing up in the sticks. I usually get callouts for major disasters these days. For a while, me and Tim and Bart, some other guys, did this thing together. I, uh." He kept on, making himself another sandwich. "When Clark nearly died, when everybody thought he was dead, a couple years ago. I was on my own for a while. It was kind of a disaster. I was... a lot younger, and you could tell it. There was a lot of media stuff and basically, I was kind of an asshole. And then I got sick, got cured, stuff and things. Uh. Clark finally decided that maybe I needed a stable home life and it would help things."

"Getting bitten by hyenas is a stable home life." He took a bite of it, watching Conner. "No, I know Martha and Jonathan are probably good for you."

Probably. Definitely, because he'd always thought if he could choose his own parents, he'd choose someone like the Kents. "Yeah, they're great. And Clark's usually great when he's not all weird and panicky about you taking over the world. I like to think he'll get over that, hopefully sometime soon. Before I have to threaten to kill him in his few hours of sleep."

"Bruce seems to agree with him." He closed his eyes, and stretched, shifting back to recline on the sofa bed with his sandwich in hand. "I want to work out your weaknesses so we can augment them with technology."

He heard Conner draw in a breath. "Seriously? That would be pretty fantastic, actually. Amazing. You think we can do that?"

"I've apparently been making clones. I'm sure I can get myself up to speed with the... the technology currently available, and work from there." After all, if he was Lex Luthor's replacement, there was no way he would've shorted himself on intelligence. It just wasn't possible.

"Well, sure. Okay. I mean, school's out in another few weeks, I'm pretty sure we'll have time." There was a hesitation, and Lex opened his eyes to look at him. Conner flushed and glanced away. "Uh, maybe if we called your bodyguards. I mean, they're out of date, information wise, but decades ahead of where you are now, so..."

"Or I can start on the internet." And hack his way to the rest, the deeper levels of information he would surely need to find to be functional. It would be a bit like starting from scratch, but it was still science, there would of course still be a logical trail to follow.

Surely?

Conner cleared his throat, shifting carefully. "Well, yeah. Just to start would be good. Hey, I think I've got some soda over um. I'll go get some?"

"Might be better than coffee," Lex agreed. He wondered where he had the soda over-um, or if Conner would run into something else super while he was up. It was always a possibility, at least in Smallville.

"More caffeine." And yeah, he seemed okay now. Not blushing or stammering, so that was good. "So. Are you awake a lot this time of night?"

"Unfortunately." His eyes felt heavy, but he was still wound up and half-nauseated, still reeling from the nightmare and the blood on the stairs. Whatever that had meant to him, before-him.

There was a quick breeze, and then Lex felt the chill of a can against his hand. "Bad dreams? Not that you shouldn't be having them, just maybe you ought to say something. We're in Smallville and all, but that doesn't mean you can't get somebody to talk to, or something to help you sleep at night."

"I've done therapy before, I think." He slid fingers to pop the lid open. "I have memories of it before, and it didn't seem effective. And how would I explain it to anyone?"

Conner shrugged. "Good point. I always kind of thought if any of us went into therapy, we'd end up in Arkham or Belle Reve or something. Not the way I want things to go. But the way you showed up with us at Smallville... we said somebody had attacked you. Trouble sleeping would be kinda natural. I'm pretty sure old Doc Gay would either tell you not to be a pussy or give you something that might help. It explains why you look so...." He paused, looked apologetic. "Tired. Bruised, maybe."

There was an odd inflection to his voice, and it made Lex pause before he took a sip of the coke. "I'm not... broken. Or bruised. I am tired, but I'm more likely to drop something on my foot than fall apart." Except for the blood issue, but that wasn't something normal people were accustomed to seeing.

"I didn't say you were broken." Lex watched him set down his sandwich. "I said you looked bruised is all. Like around the eyes, from the lack of sleep. Maybe...." Conner paused. "You wanna try sleeping out here? Fresh air might help."

Or he might freeze to death, but he was fairly sure that freezing wasn't something he could die of. "Sure. Everything was a little claustrophobic."

"You should have said something." Sure, said something, seemed weak. Lex didn't want to feel weak, not ever again.

He looked down at the can in his hands, the sandwich on his lap. "I never did 'being sick' very well, as a child or an adult. I think of this as 'being sick', writ large."

Conner reached out, snagged the can, gave him that smile that always made his heart hurt when Clark gave it. "Don't think of it as being sick. Think of it as... getting better."

"I probably don't do that gracefully, either." It didn't hurt his heart so much when Conner smiled like that, wide and open and flirty, oddly considerate, but it did make it ache.

Broad shoulders shrugged. "Hey. You haven't gotta do it gracefully. You just have to do it. Do you, uh. You probably shouldn't sleep out here alone. Do you mind if I...?"

"No. This is your room, after all." So was the first one, but. "I don't want to drive you out. I... wouldn't mind the company."

Yeah. He really did like that smile a little too much. "Awesome." Somehow, he'd eaten most of his sandwich, and he eyed Lex's for a minute before shrugging. "I'm gonna put this stuff away and then we can sleep. That good with you?"

"Yes." He took another bite of his sandwich, and expected that it would be gone in the morning. And that was all right. Lying down, closing his eyes, those were the easy part. "Thanks. I appreciate what you're doing."

Laughter, warm, not suspicious or mean. He was so tired. "Hey. You don't have to thank me. I'm just... doing what I want to do. So don't worry about it."

Saying and doing were two completely different things, and it was harder not to worry than it was to worry. "I still want to thank you."

"Then I guess you're welcome."

And tired. He was so tired, which was strange after the nightmares. Strange after the coffee, but he felt Conner moving, felt the sheet and blanket come up over him to tuck snugly around his shoulders, and somewhere in there he drifted off to sleep.

* * *

  
He hadn't gotten out of bed until well past Jonathan's first round of farm chores. Sleeping on the sofa bed left his back feeling a little stiff, cold maybe, but it had been sleep and he'd desperately needed it. Lex had staggered back to the house, washed, dressed, made his apologies to Martha and agreed to help her with the accounting when he got back from his planned expedition.

Conner had still been sacked out when he left, radiating heat that had made him a little worried at first. He hadn't moved, but neither did he seem to be running a fever, so Lex had left him there and waved at Jonathan before he climbed in the old truck. It wasn't a long trip, but it was one he knew he had to make.

He wondered if there were still cars at the castle. If there were, he was going to reclaim them. As it was, he was half tempted to wonder if he was going to need spelunking boots, and... and could a clone really reclaim something that had belonged to the last version of them? That had to be a new field of law, though Lex was sure he'd probably forged the way in it. Maybe he'd written it up in his will. Maybe the crazy women who'd shown up at the Kent farm would know. Clearly they knew about whatever plan he must have had if they'd appeared in Smallville. He just hoped they'd answer questions, considering he wasn't the Lex who'd made those arrangements.

Considering the Lex who'd made those arrangements hadn't expected those women, or maybe he hadn't expected their clones and he'd expected them. Maybe if everything hadn't gone to hell and Edge hadn't gotten a hold of him, they would've been there to help. Except it hadn't happened that way. None of it had, and that left him holding the bag.

Hopefully only figuratively.

The truck idled roughly at every stop, every slow turn, but it drove pretty okay for a farm truck, he guessed. Lex had driven a lot of vehicles in his time, but usually they were a little more high end, even the trucks on the ranch in Montana. Just thinking about that gave him a sharp pang, made him miss his mother so sharply that he had to take a deep breath. He missed Montana, and now she was even more long dead than she'd been before. There really was no going back to the way things had been, not ever, and that hurt. Made him slow down even more than he needed to when he got to the castle, and wow. He had thought of it as kind of creepy when he'd first come to Smallville, but over a few weeks he'd gotten used to it. Gotten accustomed to stone and rich wood, adjusted to the way things formed around him. Now he was nervous about going inside, and that made him want to laugh. It was his home, had been for years, he assumed, and he was intimidated rather than just unsettled. There was a weight to it, an ambiance that he supposed he'd inflicted on it or had inflicted on him over the years, and it was quite... quite a change from the farmhouse.

On the off chance, he knocked.

There wasn't any kind of immediate answer, so that left him wondering if there was a key or if he'd need to break a window somewhere. Certainly he wasn't the kind of person who'd have a random hide-a-key rock somewhere in the flower beds, so he frowned and stepped back, turning to go back to the truck and find something to help him into the house.

He jumped when he heard the door open behind him.

"Lex." It was the blonde woman. Mercy Graves. Graves and Gryme, that was just a little disturbing. "I was wondering when you'd show up. Come inside."

"I wanted to get some sleep before I came up here." He slid his hands into his pockets, trying to take in the contrast between the two women in his mental image of them. "Thanks."

"This way." He walked up the steps, slinking just a little. She didn't seem to think anything of it, just waited until he was in the foyer and shut the door behind him. "Hope's in the ballroom. I'm sure you'll want us to meet you in the study."

Apparently the layout hadn't changed, but it looked oddly different. More worn, less kept up. He, the other him, wasn't living there anymore, and the staff let it fall down between vacations, he bet. "Sure." Whatever she said sounded fine. It would sound even better if he had a revolver instead of his pocket knife, considering it had taken Clark and Conner to kick ass and take names not so long ago. He didn't let her see that; wouldn't let her see it, so he kept his hands carefully pressed against his thighs and strode towards his study, past furniture and other items that were draped to keep dust and grime from ruining them.

It didn't feel like his study anymore. Nothing felt like his anymore, and he wasn't sure how to process that except that at least the furniture seemed mostly the same, apparently a good investment from his first decorating of the place.

Lex wondered what they'd do when they got to the study. If they'd suddenly spill all of the things he wanted to know or if they'd want something from him that he didn't know how to give, or... He had no idea. Instead of worrying about it, he pulled the sheet off of his desk, off of the chair, and settled into it, left hand reaching out for a pen so that he'd have something to do.

If nothing else, he could toy with a pen and relax in a chair that wasn't his old chair anymore. He'd probably worn out the leather. There wasn't a computer to see right off the bat, which was curious.

Then again, if he was as vicious as people seemed to think he was, he probably hadn't wanted to leave evidence anywhere it might be found.

The sound of the women coming in made him look up and lean back in his chair, watching them as they came closer. They were both clearly dressed in workout gear, and watching him just as much as he was watching them. They were probably trying to figure out what, if anything, of their former employer was really there. Lex would have been, and he didn't think he'd hire slow bodyguards.

"So." It seemed funny to him, that Gryme spoke first. "You finally decided to show up."

Graves glanced at her. "We're missing some things. Maybe a lot of things."

"I'm missing things, too. So why don't we work out what we're missing and go from there?" He didn't know what they were expecting, or what he should or could expect from them. He didn't know who they were, and Lex wasn't sure he wanted to know. The other him sounded like a pretty bad person. He could only imagine what they might have done for him.

The two women exchanged glances that clearly spoke a great deal. Graves nodded and drifted out of the room, leaving Gryme behind to kick things off. "Figured you'd want some coffee. There's plenty of liquor, too. So why don't you ask questions, and we'll tell you what we know."

"Why do I need cloned bodyguards? To the point that you were on an auto-dispense timer, apparently. What happened to the last ones?" The ones who knew what the fuck was going on.

"Dead, or so we found out. It may not have been the first time. Usually, the clones get aged up to an appropriate time and then destroyed. There's always three in backup, at various stages. We're not quite as old as we ought to be, but we're a lot closer than you." She looked at him carefully. "All we've got is the beginning of the plan. Your bodyguards -- the ones before us -- they died either protecting you, or protecting the you who came before."

They died doing their job. Lex caught himself clutching onto the pen more than he was using it for a prop. "I'm sorry that they died. I don't know anything about a plan."

It was a little funny, seeing the way she grinned, almost vicious. "I can't say I know all of it, either. The original plan was to make it back here. Place of last resort. Arrive, regroup, get back to business."

Whatever business was.

"This," he gestured to himself, "the way I am. Seems to say that this isn't business as usual."

Gryme nodded. "Yeah. So that kinda leaves you, me and Mercy at odds. Question is... what do you plan to do about it?"

"I..." Lex exhaled, twisting the pen now. "I plan to get a grip on what I have and don't have now, and regroup. And start over."

She sat down, crossed her legs. He was willing to bet he'd probably considered their looks when he'd hired them. Both of those women were gorgeous, and scary, and clearly kicked serious ass. "We can give you a leg up on that. Mercy's been reviewing the old accounts. The ones that are left since Wayne Enterprises took over LeXCorp, anyway."

"Bruce Wayne bought me out?" That fucker. He'd bought him out and he was threatening Lex not to tell his secrets! "Bruce Wayne bought me out."

"More like that bitch you let run your company while you were president sold you out. She was selling you out the whole time. You'd have been better off letting the Joker run the place." Well. They certainly didn't seem to pull any punches, considering he'd just heard of the Joker last night. The smell of coffee wafted his way.

"Why did I let someone else run my company?" That made no sense to him at all. None of it made sense. "I don't even have a company. I came to town to make my father's shit factory profitable again. Fuck. Why would I do this to myself? What the hell went wrong with my life that this was my best option?"

The answer came from the doorway. "You wanted to be president. I'm pretty sure it was some kind of special pissed off reaction. There's usually only one person at the root of that." Mercy had cups and a carafe on a tray, and she moved in easily, setting it on his desk.

"Superman." That much he'd managed to figure out so far. He reached for a cup, leaning forward only at that point. "How did I lose the presidency?"

Glances were exchanged, and Hope licked her lips as she took her own cup from Mercy. "She was spying on you the whole time. Spilling her guts to Superman all the while. Half the Justice League ended up coming to try and oust you from the White House. You, ah. Made some...."

"You took Venom. It's a chemical, kind of a super steroid." Mercy settled next to Hope. "We told you it was dumb as fuck."

"Was there a reason why I took it, or...?" Or had he reached some height of megalomania that made no sense to him, from his current context.

Hope shrugged. "You want honesty or reassurance?"

"I want to know what the hell I was thinking so I don't ever think that's a good idea again." He looked down into his coffee cup. "I just wanted to get away from my father. I don't..." See how he got to the point where he was ousted from a _presidency_.

"Seems to me you spent too much time trying to shove your foot up Superman's ass. At least as much time as you spent being head of a multinational corporation." Mercy was painfully blunt, and it got her a glance from his other bodyguard. "I can't say any of us could be called fond of him. I always like to see him on the wrong foot, but we've been fucked up and running for a while. We're pretty good at that. Wears you down, though, and you were sick. Bad sick. Losing your hand was just the start of the kryptonite-induced cancer."

It startled him, and he looked down at his hands for a moment, because they were both still there. And what was kryptonite? "What... what did Superman do that I hated him so much? That he hates me so much?" What could have caused him and Clark to be at such odds?"

"Don't know," Hope admitted. "I never asked, and you never told."

"But I'm fairly sure whatever it was, it was pretty bad," Mercy added.

He was going to have to get Clark alone and ask him, because the not-knowing was going to drive him insane if he let it linger. "All right. What can we salvage?"

Vicious, feral grins. It was a little scary, but he could see where he would like that, especially since they seemed to be loyal to him. To the death, in fact, and Mercy rose again, waving a hand and leaving at a trot.

"The laptops are upstairs. It's warmer in a closed room than it is down here." Where it was cool even in midsummer, he was fairly certain. "We've been checking all of the old accounts. There's been some activity, but it's all explainable by what's been happening."

"And what has been happening?" He could find all of it out by himself, or he could save his sanity a little time, shortcut some information and then verify for himself.

Yeah. That glance declared him stupid. "Aside from Head fucking you without lube and the whole dying of cancer thing? And I'm guessing Edge having us killed with extreme prejudice? Very little. But most of the money shuffling looks like stuff we've done, or that you've done. There's about five million in one of the sheltered accounts under Lian Landry, the castle here, and..." Her mouth quirked. "A fertilizer plant in Granville. I figure it's all still there because nobody figured out the name, and because nobody seriously figured you'd go back to something that... simple."

"So I'm back to a castle, a shit factory, and very little else." Five million, though, he could put to good use. "Tell me there's a car left in the garage."

"Seven of them," Mercy said from the door, juggling three laptops as she came back into the study.

He had a car, a shit factory, and a castle. And a Kent. Apparently there wasn't much else a dying Luthor could imagine himself wanting.

That thought lingering, he opened up the laptop. They followed suit, and then it was time to get down to business. He had a list of questions a mile long, from business to what he'd done as president to what the hell kryptonite might be, and he was determined to find the answers.

* * *

  
Conner still hurt like all hell.

Pain sucked, and he didn't heal nearly as fast as Clark. Of course, Clark had a lot more years of that whole solar battery thing going on, but it didn't make Conner any less cranky about it once he managed to wake up. The fact that Lex (Alex, he reminded himself. Alex, dammit.) wasn't there didn't do much for his mood. Then again, it was probably a good thing, because he woke up with a hardon and okay, yeah, he'd thought about it. He was a guy, and he was generally kind of a hornball, but lately he'd been thinking more about Lex's scarred upper lip than tits.

He wanted to lick that scar, he wanted to do things to Lex that Lex probably never wanted to do again for the rest of his life and even if he did, how did he ask? Ask and not ruin something good, a good friendship, a feeling that he wasn't going to be alone for the rest of his endless life.

Clark sure as hell hadn't given him that. Not that he wanted dirty things with Clark, that was kind of gross, and weirdly like masturbation, but Clark hadn't been interested in him in the beginning. He hadn't wanted to deal with him, just kind of dragged him along for the ride and then kicked him to the curb, or at least wandered off and clearly not invited Conner along. He hadn't even had a name back then, just weird screwy memories.

He was familiar with being on the outside of things, and he didn't want to find himself there again anytime soon. Being on the inside was something he wanted to keep doing, and that was, that... That kind of meant finding Lex and seeing what he was doing and if he could help. Help Lex, help himself, relax a little after the damn beating he'd taken.

The fucking Joker _sucked_. Sometimes he wondered (okay, not really, but kind of) if Bruce had something going on with the guy, because seriously. Seriously, that guy never stayed locked up.

"Hey, Uncle Jon. I'm heading out for a little while. Feel the need to move around some." And find Lex.

"Okay, son. Lex took the truck this morning, probably out to town or the castle." Jon had... warmed to Lex, Conner guessed. It wasn't like a house on fire, but it was all right.

"I'll be back in time to help you with the cows, all right?" There weren't as many as there used to be. Just as well, really. Uncle Jonathan wasn't up to it.

With a wave, he shot into the air, feeling the breeze shoot around him. It hurt a hell of a lot less than running would, anyway.

He so wasn't doing this whole injured thing again. Not any time soon, at least. It made everything ache while he soared through the sky, and soaring was usually one of his few untainted pleasures.

It didn't take long to make it to the castle, slowly settling down on the front steps. The truck was parked there, and so he reached out to try the handle. It was open. Conner didn't bother yelling for anybody, just slipped inside and quietly floated down the hall, looking for Lex. He wasn't really hard to find, and Conner wasn't sure what he was expecting to find when he did find him -- laptops spread out over a desk, Hope and Mercy with their own, the three of them discussing stuff that looked financial.

"Cool." None of them so much as jumped. Maybe he wasn't as stealthy as he'd thought. "Math that isn't calculus. Looks like you guys are having fun."

The women both seemed to shift. It was minute, but it was pretty clear they were preparing to act as a barrier between himself and Lex. "Can we do something for you, Kent?"

Conner let Gryme's words slide off of him. Duck, water. Something like that. "Nah, just woke up and realized Lex had gone someplace with the truck. I got curious."

"I decided to see what needed to be done with my wayward empire. How interested are you in math that isn't calculus?" Lex looked up, and there was a funny keen look in his eyes that Conner hadn't seen yet. He sort of kind of liked it a lot.

He just hoped it wasn't clear exactly how much he liked it.

Shifting uneasily, he strolled forwards, hands in his pockets. "Math that isn't calculus is not so secretly way more awesome by comparison."

"Calculus does have its uses, but..." Lex ran a hand over one eye and the bridge of his nose. "Here, sit down and I'll talk through what we've been discussing." There was a glance to Mercy and Hope, like Lex was reassuring them. That was okay with Conner, especially if he didn't get his ass kicked from here to hell and back. Even Clark looked at those two with respect and skepticism, like he was pretty sure that they were going to pull out kryptonite at any second.

"Cool." He doubted he'd understand all of it, or even half of it, but why not?

"Apparently other me had left some resources tucked away in places I could pull them back to myself when I..." Lex made a circular gesture. "Reconsolidated. I still can't believe Bruce Wayne bought me out. That's what I get for having trusted him in school."

Dude. Like anybody would ever trust the Bat. He was, not to put too fine a point on it, totally batshit. "Probably not a good idea, no." Carefully stepping around Graves and Gryme, he slipped behind the desk and closer to Lex. "Wanna show me?"

Lex gestured him closer. "I am the proud retainer of five million in cash assets, a bit of stock, the castle, a rental in Gotham, a coffee shop and a shit plant." And he displayed a spreadsheet with far too many figures to Conner.

"Wow. That's seriously impressive. Okay, it's not multinational corporation I own the world type stuff, but it seems like a pretty good start." And then some. He wouldn't know what to do with money like that. Most people probably wouldn't. "I'm betting you've got plans for all of that."

"Yes. Yes. Most of the cash is going to stay liquid, but I'm going to make a few investments to start. It's going to take time, of course. A lot of time..." And Lex tilted his head a little, looking at Conner. "But I have a lot of time, don't I?"

Oh.

God.

He'd just thought he had a hardon before now.

"Yeah." He sounded hoarse, and his fingers tightened into fists in his pocket. "Yeah. You have a lot of time."

"Yeah. So, once I get everything swapped over to Alex Luthor, do you want to take a field trip to the town shit factory in a couple of days?" He set the laptop down, still watching Conner. "To explain that management isn't dead."

He found himself nodding. "That would be totally awesome. I'm not sure they'll take you all that seriously if you drive up in the truck, though."

Mercy's voice spoke up, sharp. "Were there this many eyefucks with Kent when you were young? It would explain a lot."

Lex leaned his head back against his desk chair. "Do I have to answer that since Clark was underage?"

His other bodyguard snorted. "Yeah, well, it was a stupid question because the answer's clearly yes. Let's go do something about dinner before we get a show."

"Ohhh, shows? That'd be nice." Well. If it was Lex's hot bodyguards, anyway. He wasn't all that sure about being somebody else's personal porn video though.

"I think it's time to take Conner home." Lex swung his legs off of the desk edge, and sat up, pulling one laptop closer. "I'll be back tomorrow to finalize details. Hope?"

"Off to play farm boy." Hope had an odd note to her voice, maybe tolerance. Conner wasn't sure, wasn't sure what either of them were thinking. Maybe he'd figure it out one of these days, although he kind of appreciated the fact that she'd made Lex feel about as old as the whole time to take him home thing had made Conner feel. After all, if things were right down to the nitty gritty, he was older than Lex.

"Yeah, well, he's pretty good at it. Better than I am, anyway."

Lex was standing up, stretching. "I paid attention somewhere along the line the first time, I think." Excess information, then, beyond the stop point Conner had thought Lex had. But that wasn't really something that Lex was hiding, either. "What else should I be doing, hmn?"

Footsteps, and that was good, really good. Great, because he was totally dying here. "Well. You could, uh. You could go do chores. Or you could totally kiss me. I wouldn't object. Not in the least. Unless that makes you want to hit me and go hide upstairs, in which case, forget I asked."

"Actually, it was a question for Hope and Mercy, but..." But, he turned towards Conner, eyeing him like a lion from a nature documentary eyed a gazelle. "So, I could kiss you?"

His tongue flicked out, licking his lips. "Well. Yeah. If you wanted to. I'm what you might call an equal opportunity kind of guy. I like interesting people." And that scar was just damned fascinating. Never mind the mad urge to reach up, touch the curve of Lex's skull.

Not many people were hot while bald, but Lex. He couldn't imagine Lex looking half as hot with hair. He didn't expect Lex to exhale shakily. "Well, a kiss."

"Except you're probably totally traumatized," Conner decided, "and so, you know, I don't want to fuck you up worse and all, if that's what it would do."

Lex's jaw seemed to set a little, and then he was closing in on Conner. "I don't think kissing will fuck me up any worse than I already am." Oh. Wow, yes, and determined kissing was maybe the most amazing thing ever. Lex was all hands on, lips on, and the way he kissed seemed to send fireworks coursing all the way down to Conner's toes.

His _toes_.

Enthusiastic response was clearly called for in this situation, and so he shifted, moved, laid a hand lightly on Lex's hip and pulled him in with a careful touch.

Careful, very careful, and Lex smacked Conner's shoulder when he pulled back from the kiss. "Jesus, I'm not going to shatter. I'm just..."

"Hey! I didn't say you were. Just. You know. I have to be careful with people." Not as careful as Clark, but the TTK had been known to go on the fritz. He didn't want that to happen to anybody while he was touching them.

"Why?" That seemed to ease it a little, because Lex didn't pull any further away, still looking at him with a keen look in his eyes.

Explanations sucked. "You're within the range of the telekinetic field. People don't usually get hurt, but...." But there was always that chance. Clark was big on the whole being careful thing, and it made him paranoid. Maybe he knew things about what might or might not happen mid-coitus that Conner just didn't know, or maybe Clark just didn't know and figured the best way to be safe was to scare the shit out of his half-clone.

"I can't die. Believe me, they tried." But it was an acceptable answer, because Lex was leaning in to kiss him again, hands at the top edge of Conner's jeans. They needed a sofa, or a really big chair, or maybe a bed.

Oh god. A bed. It had been a long time, or it felt like a long time. Before he'd come to Smallville, anyway, and with guys it had mostly just been kissing or hand jobs, but Lex. God, Lex made him want dirty things he'd only read about on the internet, things that would make Tim cover his ears and sing at the top of his voice if Conner wanted to talk about it. He couldn't help letting the hunger sneak into the way he was kissing Lex, pulling him tight and close, hand on his hip sliding to the small of his back, and in the end, he wasn't sure if the moan was his or Lex's.

It didn't really matter. All that mattered was that Lex was leaning hard against him, and god it felt good. "We should, uh..." Lex exhaled against his cheek. "Shit. Not here."

He wanted to ask. Wanted to know if he was sure, if he was all right, if he wanted to do things like that, and he didn't know how to do it. Knew he'd better not, because the memory of Lex saying he wasn't fragile, wouldn't break, was right there with him. "We could go back to the farm." Aunt Martha and Uncle Jonathan didn't come up to the loft, but that was usually after dark, not in daylight hours. "Uh."

And yet here in the castle was free reign, no supervision, no one about to walk in on him, on them, and that was a sort of awkward Conner just... never wanted to think about. Uncle Jonathan or Aunt Martha going up to the loft and seeing him and some cock that wasn't a chicken.

"We could go upstairs."

God. Just the thought made him hard enough to drive nails through a two by four, and yet he felt like he should offer Lex an out of some kind. "You're sure? I mean. We've got eternity." Moving too fast might fuck that up, and then what? Then they'd be busy not facing one another ever again over continents or something. That was a hardcore kind of suckage.

Then, they'd be Lex and Clark all over again. "We could just lock the study doors. Actually, I'm not sure about the security systems in here. I don't know what Hope and Mercy might've put in." And the idea of cameras changed Lex's facial expression.

The Fortress it would be, then.

Conner let his hand stroke slow and easy, back to hip, hip to back. "Then let's go back to the farm. We have time, Lex. All the time in the world, and I don't mind starting off slow with you if it means we're still okay in twenty years."

In two hundred.

"I'm used to wanting something now, yesterday, done. This idea that time goes on forever..." Probably didn't square well with Lex at that age, and Conner really needed to do research except it would kill some of the mystery. He liked to let things roll out naturally, and Luthor had probably cleaned up any scandalous or fun bits of his childhood. Maybe not all, but then, that's what the stacks of the Smallville Ledger were for, right?

"Takes some getting used to," he admitted. "But you know, there's time for that, too. To get used to it. And really, we're guys, so it's not like I expect you to hold my hand for a month before I let you get your hand in my panties. Just to wait until later tonight, maybe. And hey... you slept last night."

"Yeah. I did. I slept better last night than I think I have since... Since I came out of the pod." Lex still had a hand on Conner's back, and he seemed comfortable just being close. "Let's go. Mercy and Hope are probably taking this badly."

He nodded. "They're probably in the kitchen making poisonous protein shakes or something in the hopes of shoving it down my throat. And that'd suck pretty hard. You wanna drive?"

"Sure. Let's go back to the farm and... regroup." Keep Conner from being a truant layabout, maybe.

Reluctantly, he pulled his hand away from Lex's hip, fingers lingering for longer than strictly necessary. "Later tonight." It was a promise. Just thinking about it made his eyes cross a little. "One more kiss?" A question, sure, but it was more like a statement of fact because he leaned in and stole one, soft and easy. "C'mon. We'll take the truck into town and grab some pizza or something."

"Apparently, I own the coffee shop," Lex murmured, straightening his sweater. "Let me go upstairs and pack a suitcase, and then we'll go. I was apparently... half-ready for whatever I was planning. I left clothes in my size."

Clothes that probably weren't jeans and t-shirts, just at a guess. Conner liked him that way, but he'd seen pictures of Lex. It wasn't like a quick search didn't bring up hundreds (thousands) of images. Just the thought of Lex in slim dark pants made him sigh. "Okay." Like Lex needed to look any better around Conner. If he did, Conner didn't know what he'd do.

Invest in a lot more socks.

Lex shifted, looking at him for a moment appraisingly before he turned to leave the study. Conner managed to hold in the deep sigh until he stepped out, so at least he wouldn't look like a completely lovelorn dork. Never mind the fact that maybe he was.

In Lex's absence, he wandered around the study, ending up at the pool table. The balls were there, neatly racked and ready to go, and he thought about picking up a pool cue. Instead, he ended up perusing the books that lined the shelves, fingers touching them. There was a light layer of dust there, and with a thought, he sent the TTK darting along, disbursing it gently without making it fly into the air, cover the other things there.

Mercy and Hope definitely weren't house keepers, or else they'd picked a few rooms in the huge pace and were sticking to them. It was kind of chilly in there, anyway, and he had time to notice while he waited. Lex was probably triple folding underwear. It made him wonder about the Lex that had been, Luthor, about what he'd planned and what he hadn't planned, and how anybody was supposed to know if these things were going to spec. He wondered if Luthor had known Graves and Gryme might die at what was clearly a bad time, or if he'd been just as surprised as they probably had been.

"Kent?" The footfall in the doorway startled him, but not enough to leave the second floor overhang that was layered with books.

"Yeah?" She was pretty -- all smooth dusky skin, braids, velvet dark eyes. She was also a walking weapon, although maybe a less crazy one than Graves. He wondered what Luthor had thought when he'd hired her, when he'd hired either of them. Had the deception of all that gorgeousness mixed in with the whole mad, bad, dangerous to know bit appealed to him?

After all, Luthor was not a fighter... at least in public. "Don't do anything to hurt him," Hope offered, looking at him from the ground floor of the study. "Not if you don't want history to repeat itself."

Sometimes he wondered if Clark got pissed off because people assumed he was stupid. They seemed to think the same thing about Conner, and okay. Sometimes he relied too heavily on brute force and power, but he wasn't damaged or anything. "You know, I kind of had that thought myself."

The edges of her eyes crinkled. "Yeah, I hoped you had. But this is... I think Lex thought he could save himself if he did this. Give himself a second chance. And that's gotten off to a bad start, even if he won't talk about it. It was built on shaky foundations to start with because Lex at twenty was..."

A little ambiguous regarding morality at best. Not to mention a risk-taker and, well, some pretty bad things sometimes, he was guessing. "Not exactly what you'd call a white hat. Not a black hat, either, though, and things change. Events change people, people change other people. I think it'll be okay." So long as nothing got rushed.

"I hope so. Once he's on his feet again, if he wants us to go..." Hope's shoulders went tight. "We will."

"But you won't like it." That was true. It was obvious from the way she stood, from the way they'd both looked up at his intrusion. Both women were deeply involved with Lex even if he wasn't Luthor. They'd spent a damn long time protecting him, and Conner thought they had to be friends as well as kick-ass scary motherfuckers. "And I don't think you ought to have to do that. He's gonna need friends, and as much as I'd like to be the perfect bodyguard, you guys have got hella more experience at it than I do."

"It got us killed," Hope noted, folding her arms over her chest. "We've discussed it, and we're going to dismantle the cloning facilities. It needs to go fungible, and we have the blueprints."

Well that didn't sound good. It sounded like mushrooms, actually, but she couldn't possibly mean that. "Clarify that one for me. I think I missed that vocabulary unit."

"It means that a cloning factory has one purpose," Hope replied. "Cloning. And Lex needs flexibility. He doesn't know what he wants to do with his scientific genius. He needs a chance to work that out for himself."

Yeah, and hopefully it wouldn't include crazy illegal shit. Well. Conner would just have to make sure that it didn't. Nudge him in the right directions if it seemed like something Clark would find offensive, because it wasn't like Conner had always made the greatest most morally superior decisions in the world. Clark didn't, either, but he at least seemed to have some idea of what those decisions should be. "Okay. So. We'll work on that, then." Make it seem like a group effort.

Hell, maybe it was.

"Yes. Mercy and I will finish dismantling what's left of the old empire, really dismantling it, because I think that would be something we were supposed to do the first time. If we'd lived. It feels like it would be."

"Because he really is starting over." God, it was weird, that sick rush of relief. He'd known it. He'd believed it, but that tiny asinine Clark-voice in the back of his head went totally silent now, and it felt good. "You know, I believed that. Maybe I just wanted to, because... well, for lots of reasons. Clark still doesn't, but Clark can shove it where the sun doesn't shine."

"Yes, he can." She cracked a real smile. "Go on. He's probably upstairs lost in his wardrobe. Help him out. God knows I wouldn't be surprised if he had PTSD."

Huh. Well, he wouldn't be surprised either. He was more surprised that she was willing to send him up there. "And Graves isn't gonna be waiting for me on the stairs with a kryptonite-infused scythe or anything?" He grinned back at her, even saying that.

"No. Not unless you try to smack her ass or something." That 'or something' was probably hurt Lex, which was much more esoteric and yet Conner didn't think he was capable. He wasn't Clark, no matter how badly he'd tried to be.

That was before he'd known he wasn't, though, and these days he was firmly aware that he was somebody else. That he was himself, and nobody else. "Hey. Her ass is infinitely smackable. Which is not to say that yours isn't, too, but while I might be tempted, it's probably better if I don't."

"Atta boy. Make the right call." She left, and it was probably a ploy to get him to follow and actually go and see what Lex was doing, but he was willing to fall for it, whatever the case.

"See you later." Just in case Mercy had ideas of waiting for him, superspeed was totally his friend. Zip, zoom, bam, despite the tugging ache in his side, upstairs and... yeah, maybe he should have asked which room Lex was in, because not having Clark's weird eyegasms and superhearing made it a little harder.

Still, checking every door seemed like a good call. It took a few tries, but there was one door that was open which really was the big stupid hint Conner wanted.

Lex had a suitcase laid out on the bed, and he was folding shirts. Lots of shirts, it looked like, and Conner couldn't help grinning. "Are you planning on changing every few hours or just don't want to come back to the castle anytime soon?"

"That last one. There's too much space for one person. I always thought that, but I needed the trappings to..." He waved a hand a little, and then set it down on top of a dark purple shirt that was probably silk. "Build up my appearance. I might need it again. I don't like it here."

"Well, you don't have to take the whole closet today. Or if you want, I could probably give you a hand. Do it a little quicker." Or something like that. "I'll bet Hope and Mercy would be glad to pack up some of it for you, too."

"I feel like I'm imposing on them. This is their chance to start over, too." He stepped back from the suit case, though. "I think I've got enough to last me for a while."

Shirts, pants, probably underwear and socks, too. "You know, funny thing about them. They're scary as hell, but I get the feeling that they're more than just your bodyguards. Starting over doesn't always mean leaving everything behind." Not that he hadn't done that before, but Conner had learned it was easier if there were some things to keep a guy anchored to the world, to the things he wanted to accomplish. Friends were great for that.

"No, it doesn't, but I don't know them. Not really. This is the time to make a run for it if I've been a burden on them." He probably wasn't. Maybe it wasn't the problem Lex thought it was.

Conner leaned against the wide bed post and cocked his head to the side. "Funny you'd say that. Hope stopped me downstairs for a few minutes. Wanted to talk to me about watching out for you. Burden's not the word I'd use for it." Better not to mention the whole post-traumatic issues. Lex had to know that already. "They're worried about you. Want things to go well, and I'd bet they're prepared to do pretty much anything to make sure that happens. Might be better for them if you guys kind of stick together a little." He felt a little panicked saying that. "Uh, unless it makes you feel like shit, in which case, I'm a hundred percent okay with you doing whatever makes you happy."

"No, it doesn't make me feel like shit at all." Repeating that back to Conner made Lex smile, which was always good. Smiles were good. "Knowing what I know about the things I did, I'm not sure why they wouldn't run screaming for the hills."

"Did you stop and think that maybe they like you?" He tilted his head. "I mean, I like you. Possibly that makes me a little abnormal or something, but they've known you a long time. Maybe there's plenty to like about you despite those things. I think so."

"Maybe." Lex ran a hand over his face, over his scalp. "I don't know. I just... I don't know right now."

Carefully, he pushed away from the bedpost and moved to touch Lex's arm. "Hey. You don't have to know. Not anything."

"Somewhere along the line, I became my father." And from the tilt of his voice, that hadn't been a goal, ever. "And I hated him. He wasted opportunity on narrow-minded shit that just... I don't know how it happened."

Conner tugged at him, turning him and catching him in a hug that he clearly didn't want. He was stiff and tight, and Conner didn't give a damn. He leaned in, rested his chin on Lex's shoulder. "Personally, I blame all of the head injuries. I mean, the sheer number of times that Clark alone rapped you in the noggin probably led to dementia by twenty-six. Never mind all of the other head injuries."

"Is there a list of them somewhere?" Lex half-scoffed. "Shit. Shit." The stiffness started to fade a little, though. "Why would I waste so much effort on what I did?"

"Eh. There's a list, but it's on alien crystal tech. I had to call Tim and wait until there was a massive flood in China. It wasn't easy, and you don't really wanna know what's on it, anyway. Personally, I consider it a form of crazy brought on by poor circumstances." They wouldn't talk about the electroconvulsive therapy. If he didn't dig it up and ask about it directly, Conner was going to avoid that shit like the plague. It felt a little too much like torture, a little too much like what Lex had already been through, and if he thought it might trigger him to crazy-land again, it was best if he didn't know. Lex's laugh was only a little hysterical.

"Should I start wearing a football helmet?"

"Well, it might look kind of sexy. You know, we could fix it up. Paint it all sparkly purple and stuff." Teasing, maybe, but it was better to do that than to let him laugh like that, on the edge.

"Shit." Lex patted a hand at Conner's back. "Okay. This is why I don't want to stay here. If you were curious."

He had been, but not so much anymore. Now, he just wanted to take Lex out of there, make it better. "C'mon. I'll ask 'em to pack the rest of your stuff. We'll get back to the farm and put away all of this." No need to go into town when Lex was clearly fucked up.

"Sure." Just zip up the suitcase and put it away, as soon as Lex let go of him. At least it was better than punching him for all the hugging.

"I'll get the suitcase, then." With a whisper of touch, and it floated there, easier than them toting it. It wasn't like it was all that heavy, but Lex was stressed, and maybe the running had been stupid when he still ached. Stupid hyenas. He needed to rest, and Lex needed to rest, and that could mean both of them just lazing in the barn for a while. That sounded good, maybe some video games. Get him to talk, or not, but relax.

"C'mon." Easy, and Conner reached out, brushed Lex's hand.

Lex inhaled. "Yeah. Let's go. We'll start again tomorrow. You're still injured, after all." Exactly, it gave both of them an excuse.

"And I'm a great big whiny crybaby, too." Conner nudged him, got him moving. "Hey, I think your girlfriends like me. Think they'll let me watch sometime?"

"No." Lex's mouth twitched a little, but he did start to move so maybe it was a good twitch. "Not in your lifetime."

"A man can always dream." Fervently honest, and they made their way out of the room and down the stairs. And if Lex was maybe more twitchy than not, looking over his shoulder more than he should be, then Conner pretended for both of them that it was all right.

* * *

  
He'd missed his cars.

He'd really missed them with a deep, gut-level yearning that he hadn't realized until he'd gone down into the garage with Hope and Mercy and spent, possibly, most of the afternoon in there because of the cars. Some ran, some didn't, some needed work, but oh. Oh, the Porsche. God, he loved Porsches, and this one was a perfect specimen. Silvery blue-grey, the same model he'd driven over Loeb Bridge, sending Clark over with him.

He was going to be very careful not to hit Conner with it. There probably weren't that many of them left.

They were probably now the equivalent of old muscle cars, because the shape and the styling had been gorgeous at the time and it was still gorgeous now. He was going to take good care of it while he considered what other sorts of amazing cars there were in the world now.

Maybe not more Porsches, though. He wasn't sure anything could equal the sheer joy of driving the 911 through town, and definitely couldn't come up to pulling into the parking lot at Smallville High. If he'd thought the guys back then were creaming their shorts over his car, they looked like they were weak in the knees from creaming them now.

"Lex!"

"Conner!" Lex eased to a stop near to Conner, waiting to see what kind of response there was from Conner and anyone else in the lot.

"Holy crow." Maybe he'd been spending too much time with Tim, and maybe Tim had been spending too much time with Dick. "That thing is... oh God. I. I think maybe I'm in love with your car." His hands were shaking as he stroked up the line of the hood to the door.

"Why don't you hop on in. I wanted to go to the coffee shop again at least, before we go home." Tool around just a little before going back to the farm. He'd already driven a little on back roads, but he hadn't and wasn't planning on really opening up the engine. Not yet.

Not until Conner was in the car.

"Whoo!" The way he opened the door and slid inside wasn't abnormally fast. At least not any faster than a normal guy would, considering the size of his hardon.

"It's gorgeous, isn't it? How's it fare compared to cars from this decade?" Well, he hoped, but even without it, the car was gorgeous, and his prepaid for.

Clearly the old him had a very good idea of the things he'd love.

That thought startled him a little, because there had been clothes, and there had been a car, yes, but... Clark hated him. He'd wanted to be good once, for Clark, had tried. The plan, per Mercy and Hope, had been to come back to Smallville. Meet there. Plan what came next.

He wondered if the old him had known about Conner.

"It's an orgasm on wheels." Conner's hands stroked the dash, and he melted into the seat for a minute before turning a blinding smile towards Lex. "I'm pretty sure cars from this decade don't even come close." A glance out the window was a fair assurance of that truth.

"I can't fit it in the loft, you know. But we can drive it around town." Lex wanted to. Lex wanted to break sound barriers with it and get speeding tickets, but he also didn't want to draw undue negative attention to himself in town.

It didn't startle him much to find Conner leaning over, reaching out. There was a hand cupped behind his neck, pulling him close, and Lex went, all bemused. The kiss was surprisingly hungry, and he gave a soft sound into it, hand going to rest on Conner's shoulder for a few moments before it ended. "I," came the pronouncement, "really hope you plan for us to find some way to make out in your teeny tiny back seat."

"I don't think that counts as a back seat. Someone's foot would be out a window." Lex pulled back a little. "So, I've rescued you from high school."

"I'm thinking that makes us even. Especially if we proceed to make out with feet hanging out the window. Or, you know, considering the space back there, we could try the passenger side." Conner smiled at him winningly. "Or we could do whatever else it is you've got on the agenda."

Making out in weird tight spots wasn't actually on the list at all. He'd barely gotten Conner, well, and himself, to comfortably kiss in the loft, slow and heated and easy. It had nothing at all to do with the multiple exits the loft had. "Coffee shop. After that, the sky's the limit."

"Or speed, which is kind of awesome inside of a vehicle. Lex, I'm in love with your car." Unsurprising, really. Clark had always been in love with them, too, although he'd been less blatant about it.

Lex settled back in the seat, and started forward. "Yeah, I'm going to try not to have every meter maid in Smallville after me."

That earned him a blink that he caught from the side of his eyes. "Uh. Meter maids might be out to get you? I'm not... I'm pretty sure there aren't meters anymore. You're probably safe."

"State police?" Lex asked, half-curious as they eased out of the parking lot.

"Smallville police. Maybe the county deputies. But that'd mostly just be if you parked in a fire zone. Seriously, there were meter maids?" He was halfway sure Conner was fucking with him, which he might do. It wouldn't be all that much of a surprise. "I guess I'm too used to Metropolis, where everything's pretty much totally automated. City of the future, you know?"

"No, but I guessed. After all, cloning." Lex shrugged a little tightly. "I'm a little shocked we don't have flying cars yet."

That gained a scoff. "Yeah, well, can you imagine the completely fucked up chaos that would involve? Seriously. Planes alone are pretty much enough, you know? And most people can't drive all that well. Tim's convinced he's great at it, but let me tell you, I've been on some pretty bumpy rides. It's all that weird bat stuff. Hey." Hey, which was a verbal cue that Conner wanted Lex to look at him. "Are you okay?"

"I'm okay." Sometimes, he said that and it sounded completely different, but this time Lex mostly meant it. "Every once in a while I realize that I'm behind the learning curve."

"Clearly that seriously makes you unhappy. You're gonna catch up. I mean, it's twenty years of crappy history, superheroes, and technical advances that I suspect you'll be totally caught up on within a couple of months. You're kind of brilliant." Conner turned, his back a little more towards the door. "In case you hadn't noticed. I have."

"I'm not feeling very brilliant right now." He couldn't get himself free, he couldn't work out that he was a damned clone, he couldn't rescue himself, and that failing burned in ways he couldn't really articulate.

A soft sound caught his ear. "Yeah. Yeah, but see, you will." Except for the part where he didn't. "It takes a while, you know? There's a dissonance between what you think you are, and what you are, and what you want to be. You have to give it enough time, give yourself a chance to figure that out. Nothing sucks as hardcore as knowing I'm never gonna grow up to be Clark. I mean, he's. He's this amazing guy, the whole world looks at him and sees... they see _Superman_ , and they feel safe because he's there. And I won't ever be that. And sometimes, that still stings like hell." Conner paused. "But the thing is, I don't have to be Clark, either. I don't have to have his weird suspicious Luthor moments, and I don't have to marry the girl reporter, and I don't have to be anything except me. And it took a while to figure that out, to adjust to it, and to learn to be okay with it. So maybe you feel behind now, but I think you won't let that last for long, and I think maybe... maybe that other you, the one you probably feel weird and fucked up about? Maybe the whole point was to give you that possibility. That chance not to be who he was."

"He wanted redemption. But there's so much he did, so much that..." It was unavoidable that he'd slowly work out everything the other him had done. What he knew for a start was enough to make him nervous.

"So much that you're not going to do." Conner sounded so certain. "You're a different person. You've got different experiences from the start, and... uh. If you want. You've got me?"

Lex kept his eyes on the road, but it was a near thing. "I think I like you better than Clark, anyway. You're an upgrade. I was clearly obsessed with him."

The shrine had been something of a tip-off.

It wasn't much of a surprise when Conner laughed, and god. That made him feel good. "Yeah, well, I promise to be okay if you get obsessed with me instead. I'm pretty sure I'll take it better."

"Great. So, we'll start with a maybe four by six foot photo of your bare chest." Lex coasted to a stop for what he guessed was one of the town's maybe five stoplights. "I'll have to show you the hall of obsession."

"You have a hall of obsession?" Clearly Conner hadn't investigated the castle. It was just as well. Some things required explanation -- careful, precise interpretation. "I thought it was just Clark."

"Clark has one?" The edges of his mouth twitched a little. "Why does this feel like _The War of the Roses_ writ large? Like they were acting out an ancient tragedy for the same non-reasons tragedies occurred?"

"Because maybe they were? I'll be honest. It was all like something out of one of those crazy comics. Uh. What... there was a guy in purple. Warrior Angel, that was it. All crazy obsessions and 'oh my god you won't help me take over the world!' and stuff." Conner's hand reached out, slid over his thigh. "So. I'm not all that interested in taking over the world or anything. Protecting it is kind of awesome sometimes. Is that okay?"

"Probably. Very likely, yes." The edge of his mouth twitched a little. "I still love Warrior Angel, though. Is that comic even still being written?"

The light turned green and he pressed the accelerator, car purring its way through the intersection. "Last I checked. I found a whole bunch of them tucked away in the loft a while back. Got kind of addicted. You can get 'em in larger sequences at most book stores. Interested?"

"I might have to," Lex admitted. "Just as a distraction." It'd probably take him a week or two to burn through them, and Hope and Mercy were staring at him like he was wasting his life except those little enjoyable things felt like all there was, so he was going to grab them.

"You'll get it right. You're gonna need time. It's not like people think it is. It's not easy like you want it to be. It's just kind of fucked up. Lex, I don't expect you to be perfect." He paused. "Or even close. People aren't. Not real people, anyway."

"That's good. I... I'm pretty sure the last me wasn't anywhere near perfect." It was hard not to smile and smirk a little as he pulled into parking in front of the coffee shop.

Conner laughed. "Yeah, well. The last me isn't anywhere near perfect, either. So, you know. You and me, we can be not perfect together for a while. And I'm good with that."

"All right. So, rather than immediately launching my plans for financial domination, let's get a cup of coffee and I'll break the sad news about who owns the place to the manager." Start small, work his way up to it. Go back to the barn loft afterwards and read and relax with Conner and maybe follow up on the hand on his thigh.

He pushed open the door and stepped out, taking a deep breath. It was Smallville all right -- small town smells, the faint scent of cows on the wind coming from out of town, and muffins baking somewhere inside.

"Mmmm. Smells like double chocolate."

"Good. A muffin won't kill me." He half thought that Conner was trying to fatten him up for the slaughter, but he did look bad, rough, quite a lot. Too skinny, still. All of the dying and dying and dying had taken a lot.

Sometimes he wondered what Conner saw in him, anyway. He was all skin and bones and he didn't feel attractive. "Three muffins won't kill you. C'mon." His door was shut, and Conner moved around the bonnet, eyeing Lex like he wanted to touch him, to take his arm maybe. "But I'll let you get away with one so long as you don't just pick at it."

He locked the door, and pocketed his keys before starting towards the store. "You say that like I'm a bird." The door jingled a little when it opened, some sort of motion sensor. It probably got annoying after a while.

"If you'd eat a whole meal every once in a while, I'd say it less. Hey, Anna. Do they just have you working every afternoon these days?" Ah, yes. He remembered her. "Do you need me to marry you and take you away from this life?"

She laughed. "No, it's good pocket money. What can I get you two?"

"The part owner-manager, or her contact information. I need to discuss business with her." Lex smiled when he said it.

Anne shook her head, pretty curls trembling around her face. "Oh, Mrs. Ross is in Metropolis. She and Mr. Ross spend most of their time there these days. You should see little Clark, he's so adorable."

"He really kind of is," Conner agreed. "But I'd bet Anna's mom probably has a number for Mrs. Ross."

"Is your mother still the sheriff?" Or not, because Lex was still a little iffy on how much time he was off from reality. He wasn't even really sure whether it was her mom or what, to be honest about it.

From the stiffness that overtook her face, he was guessing he'd asked the wrong question. "I'll go see if Mom has that for you. But I doubt it."

What did he really say to that? Good luck dicking with him? The _'but I doubt it'_ was a nice touch, but Lex wasn't going to be put off. He had controlling ownership in a place, he was going to reassert and reclaim. "Thanks."

He could see from the wince that Conner knew what had gone wrong. He waited until Anna was gone to look over at Lex. "Yeah, that. That wasn't good. Her grandfather's still in jail for trying to kill y-... uh, Lionel Luthor."

"Oh. Well." Lex's mouth pulled sideways a little. "We're going to have our coffee spit in, aren't we? Whenever we order."

"Pretty much, yeah. That or she's gonna sneak laxatives into the cups. I wouldn't put it past her. Maybe we ought to rethink things a little." Dark head tilted Lex's way. "Like, if you want coffee, there's a place called Beans and Things a few streets over. We'd be less likely to be poisoned, anyway."

Lex leaned an elbow on the countertop, and just waited. "Mmm, this isn't going to work well. Who do I say I am, after all?"

He hadn't considered it. Not really, and he was pretty sure he was going to have to admit it, or say he was his secret son or something. Lex wasn't altogether sure the other him hadn't tried that before, either, considering the whole clothing issue. "Uh. Just. Don't call yourself junior. Right?"

"Has it been done before?" Lex drawled, standing up a little straighter.

Conner nodded. "I had dinner with him. There was a ridiculous amount of really red hair involved."

"I used to have really red hair," Lex shrugged. Well, or someone had.

"Yeah, I can imagine that. But, you know, I was thinking." Reaching up, Conner rubbed a thumb over one of Lex's eyebrows. "At the time, it seemed like a lot. You're right like this."

"I'm accustomed to it." Lex's mouth tilted a little. "And, maybe we should just go and hunt down the Rosses ourselves."

God, he loved that grin. "Bet I could make a couple of calls. Hopefully whatever security detail they've got won't try and take us down in a hail of bullets if we show up."

"Security detail?" Oh, yes. The little girl with too much pink had grown up to be second lady?

Conner nodded. "Yeah. He was president for part of a term. So... hell, Anna's probably calling their security people right now come to think of it. Maybe we should go."

"I don't think running will help. It generally makes people more suspicious," Lex said. She was taking an awful long time. "So, the Secret Service shows up. I've had worse days."

Stormy blue eyes turned his way, wide with... well, he hoped that was less sympathy and more horror. "I'm pretty sure I haven't had. Maybe we should leg it. In a hurry."

"They're going to be looking for the bald guy and the muscly kid with the sports car, Conner. It's not like they won't know where to find that." Well, there or the castle, and Conner's nervousness was funnier than anything. It wasn't as if either of them could be harmed. Much. Not in the long run.

"Well, yeah, but I'm talking about Anna coming in to kick our ass more than the Secret Service or anything. But." Well. At least he didn't look completely horrified anymore. "I'll totally snag a muffin before she gets to everybody else."

"We could always leave cash, go to the other place, and then call it a day." He leaned a little, trying to see where she was in the kitchen with her phone.

"Or we could just snag the muffins, leave the money, and head back to the barn. If you wanted." Flirty little bastard.

Or they could drink spit-coffee. "She can't hide there forever."

Conner snorted. "Clearly it's been a while since you knew any teenage females. C'mon. You head out to the car, I'll get the muffins."

"What is it about this place that thwarts my need for coffee?" Clearly that was a long-standing issue of his. The fact that he'd funded a coffee shop probably spoke to that need.

"Couldn't say." But he leaned in, gave Lex a peck on the nose that made him startle before Conner was on his way to the other side of the shop, talking to another attractive young woman. What was it about Smallville, that there were so very many pretty people living there? Possibly it was a mutation. Aftereffects of the meteor shower that all people in the town were afflicted to at least appear somewhat attractive, even if they turned into creepy werewolves or preying mantises in the middle of the night.

Anna still hadn't returned by the time Conner made his way back, a bag full of muffins and a cup of coffee in his hand. "Riley still hadn't talked to Anna yet. I figured, eh. I could live without the caffeine if I had enough muffins."

"Mmm. I'm going to make friends in this town, aren't I?" But muffins and coffee, and he could regroup from there.

"Alex?" That voice was gentle. "You've got me. And chocolate muffins. And a gorgeous classic Porsche. Seems to me that we need now is an awesome barn loft with a couch and maybe a radio."

He wanted to go forth and conquer. He wanted to seize companies, take back what was his, do it all in a month, a week, a day, and... and muffins and coffee, and the promise of a sofa. Lex tossed his keys in his hand. "So, let's blow this place."

God, that grin could power a nuclear blast. It made him stupidly hard, never mind the fact that they were in public. "I thought you'd never say it." Conner pulled open the door, its little annoying jingle sounded, and then they were out in the Smallville sunshine. The car blipped its cheery opening sound, and they were inside. Maybe they were both a little too fast for normal, but considering where they were, Lex didn't think anyone would notice. Given that he looked exactly like a dead man, Lex didn't think anyone gave a damn.

He started up the car, leaning back in the seat a minute while he did the seat belt out of muscle memory if nothing else. "So, the Secret Service will no doubt be visiting the Kent residence tonight."

"And Clark." Conner made a face. It was still stupidly attractive. "Probably to lecture us on how not awesome it is to send Anna into a tizzy."

"Pissing off the local coffee shop workers is probably better than making the sky rain blood." Lex started to work the gearbox slowly. One day, he'd open up the engine and just see how far he could push it. "On a sliding scale, one would almost expect him to be proud."

Conner laughed. It felt so good just being with Conner. It was so much like Clark, like the way he had made him feel. Like he could be a good person. Like he wanted to be the best kind of person, nothing like his father had taught him how to be. "Well. Sometimes he kind of eyeballs me. I suspect getting the Secret Service out to the Kent farm isn't far behind raining blood."

"I hadn't quite. Quite really put two and two together that Lana was the briefly president's wife." Lex shook his head a little, mostly keeping his eyes on the road.

"He was Clark's best friend when they were kids. It's hysterical to see pictures of them together. Like Mutt and Jeff, Aunt Martha says, although I'm not entirely sure what that means." No, but he was digging out a muffin. "Huh. Blueberry."

"No one spit in that, right?" He had to check, and was half-tempted to lean over and see if it looked shiny. Mostly, he wanted to get back to the attic and the temptation of illicit something on the sofa.

Conner laughed, and that hand found its way back to his thigh. "Riley's not what you'd call a spitting kind of girl. She's so nice it's nearly wrong."

He shifted, tensed his muscles -- because he was easing his foot back, sure. Right. "Good to know. So, uh.... how much homework do you have due?"

That sly look made him shiver. "Did it during home ec. It was that or get caught up in my partner's lasagna, and she seemed pretty determined to show how she could make that all on her own."

"Did it at least turn out well?" He had to ask, because it was ask or marvel at the fact that thirty years apart or more he could still find the town Kent alien jailbait.

"I've got some in my backpack. We devoured most of it at lunch. Somebody will propose to her one day just for her lasagna. Sadly, it won't be me." Oh, god, that look. The confession that he didn't have heat vision and that it was probably a good thing echoed faintly in Lex's mind and made his foot a little heavier on the gas pedal. "As awesome as great boobs and even better lasagna might be, I'm a little more inclined to the masculine charms you hold."

"I was unaware I had any charms." Left, any charms left. He was pretty sure he'd had them, and certainly every businessman he'd ever met wanted to fuck his ass, but that was different. This was low key. Soothing, almost.

Conner slunk down in his seat and laughed. "Hey. If you're in need of compliments to change your mind about that, you've come to the right place. Yeah, I think maybe you need to eat a couple of muffins, but have you... you know, _seen_ you? You walk like a living breathing invitation to be kissed."

It was hard not to chuckle, and Lex eased back on the throttle because the turn was coming up. "You say things like that when I can't do anything about it."

"You're more likely to remember it when I can't kiss you. I don't know about you but I get a little fuzzy once the kissing starts."

He wondered if the Kents knew what they did, or if it bothered them at all. There hadn't been any indication, but Lex wasn't sure that was actually a sign of anything. The Kents had been nothing but very kind to him. If they did find out, he wasn't sure that they'd continue to be nice, although they had allowed him to live in the house. They'd been solicitous of him, and he wanted that to continue. He wanted things with Conner to continue, too, though, and he was pretty sure that he'd chance it for that.

A hand gently fanned near him as he turned into the driveway. "Hey. Big thoughts?"

"Hmn? No, I was just wondering if I was overstaying my welcome as a house guest." He just didn't want to leave, didn't want to stay in the castle. It didn't feel like home, and the Kent's place was just. Comfortable. Safe-feeling. It didn't have the trappings of money that made him grimace inside.

The car slowed to a stop and Lex glanced to the side. The way Conner's jaw clenched tightly made his blink. "Nobody wants you to leave, and if they did? Then we'd have a long discussion about how you aren't."

"It's not that. I like staying there, with you. The castle doesn't have any good associations with it." He'd only just started to sleep again, evenings in the barn making it so easy to drift off.

"Like I said. If anybody has any objections, we'll have a long discussion about how you aren't leaving." Conner leaned over and caught his mouth, quick and easy, unembarrassed. Maybe times had just changed that much, or maybe he was just totally shameless.

Either way, what bliss.

"Out of the car," Lex sighed, pulling back as he popped his own door open. Better to spend time in privacy, even if things had changed that much. He'd done enough being watched, even if he only thought that Jonathan would frown and tell him to go bail some hay.

Conner was right behind him, out of the car and around it to stand next to him, coffee and muffins in his hands. "C'mon. Aunt Martha said something about going into town this morning, so I figure it's just us anyway."

"And the farm animals," Lex agreed, shutting the door and locking it with a button push. Cars probably sensed human presence nowadays, but. He liked the car he had and wasn't ready to start shopping for new ones. Not when five million felt like pennies.

"Yeah, but I'm pretty sure Bessie doesn't care what kind of noise we make, Lex." Not Alex, and he was glad of that. Alex didn't feel right, it never had. Being a clone hadn't changed any of that. Conner switched his grip so that the bag was held along with Lex's coffee then reached out and snagged his hand, palm to palm. "C'mon."

"Coffee, muffins, and you. I think I prefer this to bread and wine." He wasn't sure what he'd do or how it would go, but he was never sure, not quite, and Conner didn't seem to care that it was unpredictable. He just let Lex have his way, and while Lex remembered having very dirty fantasies in which Clark did the same, there was something. Just a little nudge of memory, or maybe even not-really-memory, that said it would never have come out that way.

One day, that grin was going to melt him down into a useless puddle. "That's good, because they're what I've got." That and stairs, and he tugged a little at Lex as they started up them, wood worn smooth with footsteps over the years.

The light was bright, pure, and the air was mostly clean thanks to diligence with the cow. It felt like it had twenty or thirty years before except there were no lies, no unnecessary tension. Except. Well. The urge to kiss Conner stupid and let the coffee go cold and the muffins go stale and dry was immense. Then again, it'd take a couple of days for them to get moldy, so a couple of hours wouldn't be that big of a deal.

"Hey, I... mmmm." Mmmm, and that was nice. That was a perfect sort of sound, better than the thunk of the coffee on the floor, the muffins probably destroyed next to them. He didn't care much. "Oh. Hi."

"Sofa," Lex sighed, mouth lingering against Conner's. They probably had a good two, three hours before the Secret Service showed up, if they showed up at all. Lex wanted to feel Conner in that time, just... see how far he could go. See how good it would feel, and if he could just enjoy this as much as he thought he would.

The movement to the couch was slow, drifty, Conner moving them without ever needing to part. A single touch, a thought, and the sofa opened, pulling out with sheets still rumpled and creased from the night before. "Oh, God, Lex, that's...." Clearly good, and Lex felt it when the telekinesis thinned, slipped away from Conner's skin to focus somewhere else for a while, leaving him open for Lex to taste, to mark just a little, kissing Conner's neck and mouthing his collarbone because Conner tasted good, like skin and a little like Old Spice shower gel. How horrifying that of all brands, Old Spice had survived. Still, it was clean and Conner was moaning. Shifting, moving firmly against Lex already, and yes. Yes, god, that was good. Just hearing him, feeling the way he pushed up to rub against Lex's thigh. The way he allowed Lex to have control.

"Love this." Softly murmured from reddened lips, pressure-swollen from kissing. "God, I've never... Not like this."

"Just want you." Just Conner, Conner without a t-shirt on, Conner without a belt or his jeans, just more of him, bare. It was almost enough to inspire Lex to strip down a little just so he wouldn't be overdressed. Almost, but the extra bit of control it gave him was something he still needed in that moment.

He wouldn't need it always.

Lex nipped, a light, easy bite, and Conner's breath released in a jerky exhalation. So responsive. So fucking sweet, and he was, they both were, hard as a rock. "God, just. I..."

He was beautiful. Beautiful and powerful, and Lex clearly had help in the steady stripping of his clothing, because they were pulling, tugging, floating their way into a pile on the floor. The upper part of the loft window was open, there was no way of preventing anyone from walking right up the stairs to the loft, and Conner was naked in the brilliant Kansas sunlight, bare for Lex to see and touch. He hadn't seen Conner naked like that before, naked and uncovered and totally uncaring of it, but there was no Lana Lang high school sweetheart to stumble on them. "Fuck." Fuck, dark haired Adonis was only partially right, because his statuary had been hung like a gerbil, and Conner was so much more than that.

"If you want." His cock jumped at the statement, at the sea dark eyes that were looking straight back at him, heated and needy and so damn steady. Like he knew exactly what he was saying, what he wanted, like this wasn't a dance with two steps forward and three steps back. Like it never would be. "If you...."

He wanted and he didn't want at the same time, which was horrible, because Conner was gorgeous and offering and old Lex never would have said no to an opportunity like that but now he had nightmares and real reasons to have them, memories that didn't seem real, didn't seem physically possible.

Lex leaned up, reaching for Conner. "Jesus, just let me feel you."

Touch him, hands stroking down that finely muscled chest, lingering even as his fingers shook. Trembled with fear and need and maybe a little bit of desperation. Conner's head dropped back when the thumb of Lex's left hand found his right nipple and plucked at it, teasing it to a hard peak. "Oh, god, that... yeah. That."

He exhaled in a little hiss, rolling his thumb across that soft surface again. "Closer." Lex wanted Conner almost in his lap, or the other way around. Close and half-familiar, and that made him wonder, but those were questions for Clark, not Conner, and he wasn't sure he wanted to taint that.

"C'mon. On the bed." Sofa, whatever, and Conner moved him with hands and legs, powers not involved, maybe so he could remain hands on, touching Lex. His shoulders rested against the back of the sofa, legs stretched out on the shitty mattress, and then Conner was where he wanted him, straddling his thighs, gaze glittering as he watched Lex. His hands were stroking Lex's upper arms, but it was clear that he wasn't going to make a move without Lex's obvious approval.

"How about we say everything is a yes until I say no?" Lex murmured, sliding a hand down to Conner's ass just because tight muscle under his fingers felt so good, and the way it showed on Conner's face was perfect.

"How about we say I'm all yours until then?" Entirely, and his breath hitched before Conner leaned down and caught his mouth, kissing him again. That tongue swept inside like he knew what he was doing, and if the way the girls in Smallville acted was any kind of indication, it was probably true.

He pulled at Conner, got him to settle more than straddle because it wasn't like he was going to break if Conner sat on his thighs. He liked the feeling of Conner's dick against his skin, and the shared warmth. "Yeah, this feels good."

That earned him a laugh, and Conner rubbing steadily against him, dick, chest, hands. "Feels even better from this side. Do you like it?" Flirty glance peeked through thick black lashes. "Do you like me here, like this? Naked while you aren't?" He leaned in close, gentle nipped at the lobe of Lex's ear, teasing the shell of it with his tongue. "Do you want to..." A pause sounded, as if he'd gone breathless just a little. "...to fuck me? Slide in, slick, have me in your lap just like now?" There was a tinge of embarrassment to the words, as if saying them shook him. Whether it was from desire or a bashfulness defeated by their situation, Lex couldn't say.

He wanted to.

Wanted to slick his dick and push into Conner and ride him slow and lazy. "It might be better if I get my pants off."

There was something like amusement in that desire-drunk look, and Lex gasped. Threads, material, came undone and filtered to nearly nothing, sun-motes dancing in the afternoon light. "We could manage that."

And then he finally had skin on skin, and Conner almost on top of his dick and faintly fuzzy legs on Lex's bare thighs. The urge to lean up and just crush Conner close maybe spoke to a different kind of urge, but the kissing was something else. Was so good, and Conner's mouth was soft, went more sweet than libidinous, as if he knew or could tell what was going on in Lex's mind. One palm cupped the back of his head, slid down his scalp to the nape of his neck, and when Conner moaned, Lex thought it was the best thing he'd heard in... maybe ever. He stretched, flexed one leg, pressing up against the underside of Conner's thighs, reveling in the feeling, the muscle that wasn't going to yield, the lips lingering against his mouth when he leaned his head back against that palm. He still had a hand halfway on Conner's ass, and the other was curling up to feel Conner's jaw.

It only surprised him a bit when Conner pulled back. "Hey."

Lex blinked. "Hey."

"You realize this. This here. I'm. I don't, you know, usually... I mean, flirting's awesome, second nature, even, but this is...." White teeth bit full lower lip. "I mean, with us. It's gotta be serious. We're not talking summer fling or high school romance, I..." He didn't finish the statement, just darted back in to kiss Lex again as if talking about it were harder than he could deal with.

Maybe it was. Maybe it was harder than either of them could deal with, but Lex pulled at him, slipped a hand down to wrap around his hip, close enough to do more. "No, this is something more long term."

"We're gonna be around a while." Warm breath washed over his nose, and it was a surprise when that soft mouth pressed tentatively between his reddish brows. "Don't let me fuck this up for the short term. Promise me."

"Promise." It startled him that he said it at all, because how was he of all people supposed to keep things from being fucked up? He was a master of fucking up, a true genius at ruining his own life. The sparking thought that both of them might have the Luthor fucking-it-up gene should have stopped him. Maybe it should have made him sick or made him wonder what kind of crazy had possessed him, but it didn't. It just made something well up thick and good in him, because Conner maybe knew. Understood, and Lex couldn't remember wanting anything so much, couldn't remember ever having anything that came close to that.

There was too much risk that it could all go wrong, but it was stupid to deny himself something good when his life had already gone to hell. From the start, from his first breaths out of the damn tube. Conner was close, and he liked that, liked the press of a mouth against his face. "So, I think frottage is a viable option, and you're gorgeous naked."

"Frottage sounds like a fantastic option." So much earnestness in one package. "But you know you can do anything you want. You can't... well, you could hurt me. But I know you won't." It was nice that somebody believed that about him. "Here." Here meant lotion, slick stuff that would make it easier for them to rub off on one another.

"I know, but when we do that, I'd like... a little more privacy. A little more lead in." Lex slipped his fingers in with the slickness, his other arm still tight around Conner. "Candlelight, maybe." Okay, it was a little goofy, but it got him the sweetest look, and a kiss that was grateful and hot and full of promises that nearly took his breath away.

Conner's tongue lapped out, licked over the scar on his upper lip. "I think maybe we can make those arrangements. Privacy, a little more lead in, candlelight. Check." That sounded so good, and the way he was moving, pressed chest to chest, thighs spread wide, certainly made Lex want him even more. Good things were worth waiting for, or at least he thought they were. Maybe he hadn't always but Conner was worth the wait. Worth the effort. Worth taking his time with and not risking the Kents walking in on them. Lex snuck his fingers down, lightly touching Conner's dick with slick touch.

It gained him the most interesting sound, and a trembling shove of hips. "God, fuck, that's... that's good. That's almost too good." He laughed a little, a shaky sound. "This is so good with you."

"Good. This feels good." Calm and easy, just his hand on Conner's dick and Conner leaning into him so warmly. "Touch me. Please."

"That's handjobs, not frottage." But his fingers were slick, and sneaking down between their bodies, too. He touched Lex, warm and firm, wrapped around his cock and stroked. "Oh. Oh fuck." Fuck, and Lex slowed, began to move his own hand in time with Conner's.

Close enough that their knuckles were bumping and Lex shifted his hand, shifted his hips, because he did want to feel Conner's skin on his in more ways. "Here, uh..." Closer, and he squirmed his ass, trying to get himself moved down so that they could do more rubbing and less stroking. It wasn't much of a surprise when he felt them lift, move, shift until Conner was rolling, Lex on top of him, looking down. That was an all right position, even if he was just going to wrap his arms around Conner and grind his dick against him.

"Good. God, that's..." Good wasn't even close. There weren't superlatives enough, not for the way it felt or the look of Conner under him, flushed, dewed with sweat, lips parted. "Please. Lex, please, I want. I want...."

"Yeah. This is, this..." Was amazing, enough to make him take in breaths that shook while he thrust against Conner. He could see the frantic beat of pulse underneath the sun-burnished skin of his throat, and leaned down to suck at it, moaning at the taste of salt and skin. The sound clearly did something very good to Conner, as well, because he pushed up, up, up, one foot hooked over the back of Lex's ankle.

"Please. Please." Not 'God' or 'Oh' or 'Lex'. Just please in a way that said everything was good, right, the way he wanted it, and that was such a complete turn-on. Quietly pleading, all for him, and he could kiss and touch what he wanted, suck at that pulse point and lean hard with one hand on Conner's shoulder. "Please. Please, that's.. oh god, it is so sexy when you..." When he something, and Lex didn't know what that was, but he would definitely find out later so he could do it as often as possible.

Often.

But just to dip his hips and use his fingers to guide them together, overlapping and bumping Conner's own fingers, and to set his own pace? That was nice. Hot, and he recognized the way Conner was starting to shake, the soft grunts in the back of his throat. He was close, and that meant both of them were, so he sped up, and tried to keep his rhythm.

"Please, I... unh!"

Just thrust counterpoint to Conner, thrust the way he wanted to, controlled the situation and ground his way through it, stutter-starting when he started to come all over Conner's fingers and Conner's belly. "Fuck."

Fuck, because it felt so good. Felt safe, felt like a bolt of sizzling pleasurable lightning from his balls to his brain, and unh. That was. That was perfect, the world hazing out for a moment from the sheer force of it. Conner was openmouthed and panting when he managed to focus again, still trembling from his own orgasm.

"Oh god. If it gets much better, 'm not sure I can bear it."

Lex shifted, laid down on top of Conner so he could press kisses against Conner's panting mouth. "I'll be proud if we just maintain that."

That and the kissing, because that was so good. Easy and close, and Conner seemed like he meant it, all eager and sweet. It made his chest ache. "Yeah, that's good, too. But I think it'll get better."

He liked that reason for his chest aching. "We're going to have to get inside and shower, or else we're going to smell suspicious." Then again, he mostly wanted to stay right where he was, spread-eagled on top of Conner.

Dark lashes were drooping, and the almost-jerk that brought them up again was only temporary. "'m thinking... not so much with the moving right now."

"Luxuriate for a minute," Lex murmured, laying his head down. "Mmm."

He was comfortable, even if they were sticky. He wasn't altogether surprised when he felt it dissipating from between them, even with Conner sighing sleepily below. He reached for the blanket from the back of the sofa, and pulled it absently over them, to at least cover his ass. "We can get up in another hour."

"Mhm." Easy agreement, and he shifted just a little, squirming off of Conner enough that he was comfortable before closing his eyes. One arm curved around him, holding him close, and Lex gave a faint noise. Just a few minutes. Just a power nap, maybe...

 

* * *

  
Leaving Metropolis had sucked. Memory-wise, that was only of couple of months ago. He'd hated it, been angry to be exiled to Smallville and the shit factory there.

The last three days had been spent in and out of law offices and banks followed by Hope and Mercy, who'd insisted on accompanying him to the city. He'd spent the nights studying all of the databases and information the Other him had left behind. He'd been uncomfortable with having them so close at first, but it had come to be something almost easy by the time it had come to the end. They hadn't looked anything like they had when they'd showed up at the Kent farm, which was funny. They'd been more feminine, looked younger, nothing at all like themselves. Like they'd fallen into a role, a position, and maybe they had. Maybe Lex had requested it of them, and that was how they masked what they were. It was strange, and Lex was somewhat uncomfortable with it.

By the time he'd made it back to the castle and dropped them off, he'd never been so glad to have a moment purely to himself. It wasn't that they weren't nice, that they hadn't been trying to help him. It was just that it made him uncomfortable, made him grateful to have a few minutes alone. He'd be even more glad to get back to the farm and see Conner.

He gunned it just a little. No big feats of speed, but it was good to open the engine up a little and dream of getting home. Dream of Conner and the Kents and that strange elusive home-feeling. It was just there, but maybe he'd pulled some of the sense of dread with him from Metropolis. There was just something odd about the place when he pulled into the driveway.

Something that wasn't right.

"Conner?" No response. Nothing but silence and the wind blowing, no tractor, not a single mechanical sound. Jonathan should be puttering around, checking the garden, going out with Conner to check the cows. "Martha! Jonathan! Conner!?" Louder, and he shut the car, didn't lock it, probably didn't lock it, and just ran, ran hard into the barn first.

It was a disaster.

Tools were scattered everywhere, milking stalls open, everything looking like a tornado had whipped through the working level. The first step up was under his foot, and the seconds between the barn door and the loft melted sickeningly into no time at all. "Conner? Conner!"

No sign.

No sound.

Nothing except chaos.

He stood there, staring wide-eyed, and then he half-stumbled for the door, headed for the house because if there was anything, any sign of Martha or Jonathan, any hint, he had to find it. There had to be a clue, Conner wouldn't just leave, the _Kents_ wouldn't just leave.

"Martha! Martha! Jonathan!" The rising tide of frantic emotion made him sick to the core as he rushed out of the barn and up onto the porch, flinging open the back door. There was more disturbance, everything in disarray, and he didn't know what to do. Where they were.

Where the hell Clark could have been.

"Fuck!" He kicked the door jamb, half afraid to go upstairs in case he found them dead up there. It wasn't, it wasn't anything Lex could not-imagine, and he stalked down the stairs. "KENT! Superman!"

Nothing.

No whoosh, no deep voice, no scary-bizarre arctic-blue eyes glaring his way.

He didn't know what to do.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck. He exhaled, and pulled his cell phone out of his pocket. He had Mercy and Hope, and he had them for that reason, and he was calling them before he called 911.

 _~"Gryme."~_ Just the one word, short, sharp. _~"What's wrong?"~_

What was wrong? More like what wasn't wrong.

"The farm's been trashed and the Kents are gone." There, that was simple. "I wanted to call you before I call 911. Conner is gone."

 _~"We'll be there in five minutes. Don't move. Don't hang up the phone. Mercy! Get the Diablo."~_ There wasn't even any answer, no talking back. He could hear footsteps, running, breathing.

Five minutes.

He wasn't sure why they wanted him not to hang up the phone, but he stood there, phone in hand and held away from his ear, turning, looking at the look of the farm, quiet.

"Clark Kent!" Nothing. Nothing, and if Conner was gone, maybe Clark was gone, too. The panic setting in made him sick, made him want to sit down and collapse on himself. "CLARK!!!"

Nothing. No sign, and then a thunderclap of sound, and another, and a third, and when Superman touched down in front of him, he left a small crater. He was covered in mud, and blood, and maybe other things. Things Lex didn't want to think about, scary-blue eyes narrowed in on Lex sharply. "Something is wrong."

Clearly.

"I come home from Metropolis, the place is trashed, and your parents and Conner are gone." He didn't turn off his phone, just lowered it. Finally thumbed it off.

He didn't see Superman move, but he knew that he did; the breeze whipped past him and back, and then it was Clark there in front of him, jeans and flannel, tousled curls and green eyes behind glasses. "There's blood in the loft, and in the orchard. It's fresh. Funny that you weren't here."

"You can waste time suspecting me, or you can help me find them," Lex ground out, pocketing his phone. "Your choice." He didn't give a damn which. Not two fucks, and the loud squeal of tires meant that Hope and Mercy were coming. Now, he just needed... needed Clark to have a little faith in him.

It surprised him when Clark nodded. "Have you checked the hospital?"

Such a mundane question when there was blood in two places and Conner was _gone_. He wouldn't be gone, not just like that, not with blood in the loft, not... He wouldn't be gone.

"Not yet. I just got here." And called Hope, called Mercy. "I'll do that if you'll see if there's anything you can find." Hospitals were mundane work, and Lex... Lex didn't have super powers. Lex didn't have anything, and he didn't know what to do. He wanted to howl at the sky, because he didn't even have enough damned money to start bribing people.

The Diablo flew into the yard, screeching to a stop, dust flying even as Clark blurred out of sight. Twenty year old cars, all perfectly functional now if they hadn't been before. The doors were open as soon as it came to a stop, and they looked more like women who could kill someone with a single thumb now than they had for those three days in Metropolis. And all he could really do with it, with that sort of ability, was ask them to drive him to the hospital. He started towards them, wondering if Clark was going to call 911 or if it already had been or. Or.

He didn't know, and the world was collapsing in on him, sickeningly close and wrong. Conner was gone. _Conner_ , and that meant that whoever took him had to know he wasn't just Conner Kent, he was Kon-El, Superboy, he'd be Superboy forever. He'd assured Lex that he was eternal, that both of them were, and...

His head rocked to the side, the firm slap of a palm catching him unaware. "Breathe, Lex." Mercy looked straight at him, assessing. "We need to figure this out."

"We're. We're going to the hospital, and we'll start there." Lex clenched his jaw, and tried not to look as startled as he felt.

"Okay." Like all she'd needed was for him to tell her what they were doing. "Come on. Hope's staying here." To do what exactly? He wasn't going to ask, and Mercy clearly wasn't going to let him drive, either, since he was being herded at the passenger side.

They didn't need him to tell them what to do, but if he was trying to give orders that had to be a good sign. "I can't believe someone could take him."

Not when he was powerful, not when he... but there had been blood in the loft, and in the orchard. Two-pronged attack then, maybe, and if Conner was using his telekinesis to try and protect Martha and Jonathan, it could be feasible. It would have to be well-timed, and it made Lex damned suspicious of what had happened in Gotham. There were people who would know that it was possible to hurt Conner in the right situation. A dark well bloomed somewhere in the center of him, spreading through him until he shook with it. He didn't want to be Luthor, not ever, but if someone had hurt Conner....

"Everybody's got secrets. Sometimes they trust the wrong people instead of the right ones. Maybe he trusted somebody who trusted somebody else." She had her seat belt on, one hand on the key. The engine revved loudly as she turned over the ignition.

"Conner's very low key about it. I don't think, I can't see him just blurting out what he is." Lex leaned back in the seat, mouth a flat line as he halfheartedly buckled the seat belt.

There was something calculating about the look she threw him before she put the car in reverse and started out again, low-flying. "What or who?"

"What. Who... is a Kent. It's him." Lex waved a hand. "What... is the worrying part."

The Diablo took the turn onto the main road with a screech of rubber that would probably make anyone else grab for the door handle, the dash. "If you say so." Mercy was concentrating on the road ahead. "But I have to tell you. I kind of like this you. 'What' seems a choice of phrase that I'm more familiar with. You always called Superman 'the alien', like that would distance you from him. Don't know that it ever did."

"Conner's a clone. I'm a clone. I think I'd be an asshole to try to..." Lex rubbed at his temple. "Fuck. He should've been _safe_."

Safe, because there was a disconnect there. Superboy worked in Metropolis, in Gotham, in Central City. Not in Smallville, and there was nothing to mark him as being Conner Kent. Nothing at all unless...

Somebody knew Clark Kent was Superman.

"We'll find him. And when we do, whoever has him will be very, very sorry." That wasn't a threat. He understood it for what it was -- a promise.

It still didn't fix anything. Revenge didn't undo what had happened, no matter how much Lex wished it could, that it could really actually make everything better rather than in a distant detached way. "We're looking for someone who knows who the Kents are."

"So that limits the pool, hopefully." The Diablo whipped around a tractor and a semi before pulling back into the proper lane of traffic, just ahead of an oncoming car. "We probably need to ask... Clark, then. What he knows. Maybe check who's been into any of the old records." Their records.

 _His_ records.

"How many people did I tell Superman's identity?" He'd brought it on himself, he was sure of it. The other him had tried to fix things, but he'd already done the damage, damaged himself, damaged his replacement, damaged his half-clone.

Oh God. It was all his fault, and that sinking feeling was even worse than the darkness inside of him.

Mercy snorted, finally slowing the car as they came into town, the light turning red too far ahead for them to fly through it. "Not anybody, ever. I know. Hope knows. Faith might have suspected, but she's been dead for years, and she never would have said anything."

"If I wanted him destroyed...." That would've been the most obvious route. Really, there was no competing with ruining a man's family, and yet. He hadn't, hadn't done it. Because he still wanted Clark as his. It made him one sick bastard, but he could see himself feeling that way. He felt that way about Conner, too, a tender sort of possession that he couldn't remember feeling for Clark but he must have. Otherwise, he'd have spilled the secret to everyone who ever wanted it.

"Yeah. Always pushing away with one hand and drawing close with the other." Lex looked at her, saw the way she licked her lips before the car purred forward again. "It's different now. Don't question that."

"Mostly I wonder how I ever seemed sane to myself." But it was there, and he could do that. He could do it all. He just didn't want to, he wanted to read and laze and have Conner for enjoyment, not decoration.

Mercy slowed and swung the car into the emergency room parking lot. "I think I'm the wrong person to ask. You always seemed horribly, terribly sane to me."

"Maybe I didn't talk about how much I wanted to sleep with Clark. It does add a different edge to it." He unbuckled his seat belt before they stopped, bracing a hand on the dashboard.

There'd probably be a ticket for parking in the fire lane, but he didn't give a damn right at the moment. He was out of the car as soon as it stopped, and Mercy wasn't far behind him as they made their way into the ER. He was already inside by the time he started to worry about privacy laws, and visitation rules, and the fact they might end up tossed out right there. He just wanted to find Martha, find Jonathan and see how they were. See what they knew.

Find out if they were even present and accounted for, or... he didn't know what.

The place wasn't overly full. There was a couple with a kid and a vomit bag, a teenager tending an elderly lady with a blanket and high spots of color on her cheeks. It wasn't much of a surprise when the security guard looked up from the desk. It was astounding when he seemed to recognize Lex. "You're the other Kent boy."

"Yeah. I just got back to the farm. Where's Aunt Martha?" He'd roll with Tim's silly idea to ID Lex as a Kent, too, if it got him into wherever Martha and Jonathan were. Half the town had to wonder where all the cousins came from, and if cousin really meant they were Jonathan's illegitimate kids.

"She's in with your uncle Jonathan. Hang on a minute, I'll get her for you." As if it was that easy, as if he didn't even have to prove who he was, and maybe he didn't here. Mercy was hanging back, and a glance revealed her looking a lot less scary again, more like she had in Metropolis. It made him wonder momentarily if somebody taught a class in doing that.

"Thanks." Getting Martha meant she was possibly mobile, and that was the best outcome Lex could hope for, given how trashed the farm had looked, and the blood. Jonathan, possibly?

Probably, and the guy stepped away from the desk, entering a code to slip deeper into the emergency room. Lex stepped away for a moment, closer to Mercy, who had found a seat and a stack of tacky magazines. "Hey. I'll be here when you come out. If Hope finds anything...."

"Don't leave without me." He wanted Conner back, and time was important. Time was, as the saying went, of the essence. The sooner they found who, they could work out where and what and why. The why didn't matter to Lex as much as it should've. The only thing that mattered was getting him back in one piece.

"Hey, Alex? Come this way." Not a security guard, but a nurse, the guard slipping through the door and holding it open for Lex to follow her. "We've got everything under control for now. We're just working up the admission papers. Your uncle's going to be fine."

"What happened?" He still didn't know, so it was a genuine question, he had no idea except that something bad had happened. Something awful.

That smile was edged with false reassurance. "It's okay. I'll let your aunt Martha tell you, all right?"

"Okay." Okay, and shit, he was shaking when he put his hands into his jacket pockets, balling them into fists. "She's all right?"

"She's fine. Right through here, okay? Are you all right?" Clearly they must not have any idea about what had really happened or she wouldn't be asking him that question.

"Yeah." Lex shrugged his shoulders a little, and tried not to feel too tense, too afraid with anticipation. Conner was the next focus, get an idea of what had happened and then find Conner.

"Lex!" It was probably close enough that the nurse or whatever didn't notice it wasn't Alex. There was Martha, pale, tearstained, sitting beside Jonathan who had clearly been on the wrong end of something damned serious if his leg was anything to judge. "Oh thank God."

He'd never thought a Kent would be grateful for his presence like that.

"What happened?" Lex moved in closer, hugged her. "Where's Conner?"

"I don't know. We... This afternoon, we went out to check the peaches. There was... There were men." Her voice was low, shaking. "I don't know what happened to Conner. They had guns, and someone brought in a truck. I'm pretty sure that they had...." Martha stopped, glanced around. "Kryptonite." The assumption that he knew what that was rested between them, and god help him, it was true now. "That they'd been in the barn before they ever came up to us. They pushed Jonathan, and he landed horribly, and they took Conner!"

"Hope and Mercy will stay with you. Well, one of them will. Clark's... around." That was the best he could say and she had probably already seen Clark. He could tell from her face and the way she nodded that he'd been there.

On the one hand, it felt like he'd been sent on a fool's errand. On the other hand, it reassured him to know that at least Martha and Jonathan were all right. Mostly. "Lex, what are we going to do?" We. Not just him or them, but we.

It didn't matter that he still had no idea. "What did the truck look like?"

"Just a big truck, about the size of a U-Haul. I didn't notice any kind of markings, but I think... I think I caught a glimpse of the tag on the way out. It looked like a Kansas plate but I can't be sure. Maybe... maybe Clark will be able to find out something more."

A moan from Jonathan caught her attention, and Lex bit his lip, brows knitting. Not very many people knew about kryptonite. "Maybe," Lex murmured, looking over at Jonathan. "Is there anything I can do for you?" Other than find Conner. Before he could find Conner.

Martha sat back down, reaching for Jonathan's hand. "No. No, sweetheart, there's nothing you can do. Just... just find him."

Nothing simple he could do, anyway.

"I will. We will." Lex put his hands back into his jacket pockets. "I'm going to go see what there is to find in the grounds. I'll call you if I find anything."

She nodded, then looked up at him. "Lex. Please. Be careful. All of you. Be careful."

"We can worry about careful after we get Conner back. Until then..." Until then, Lex was just going to look, hunt, seek, and not stop until they found him. Conner had done it for him. There wasn't any other option open to him, or to Clark. Lex would do whatever he had to do, and he'd make sure that Clark did the same.

Somehow.

* * *

  
Pain.

Pain was not good. He was a great big whiny crybaby about painful stuff, because things weren't supposed to hurt. He'd never really gotten past the shock that energy-based attacks were fucking piercing, and that thing with the hyenas...

A cracked sound parted his lips despite every attempt to keep it behind his teeth. His throat was fucked up from screaming earlier, so maybe that was the only sound he could make

Yeah. The hyenas had nothing on these crazy fuckers.

"What do you think about live open heart surgery?" It wasn't directed at him, but it really fucking mattered to him because it was _about_ him.

"Too risky. With the stones in such close proximity, the subject's not healing quickly enough. Maybe if we pulled them away, but then we have the same problem we had earlier. Whatever force it is that his body's producing would come back into play."

Fuuuuck, he'd love that. He'd love that whole lots, but all Kon could do was whimper. He'd stopped crying ages ago, except when suddenly he'd tear up all over again. Usually that meant they were cutting parts of shit that he found vitally necessary for living. He kind of figured he needed his liver -- he was human, after all. He wanted to live, and live well and just. Live and that, right then, was not living. That was crazy. "We could farm him."

"It's a brilliant notion. We should see just how much we have to cut out for it to regenerate. On both ends. After all, if we cut too much, it'd be like killing the golden goose." Chuckles.

Yeah. It wasn't very fucking funny, in Kon's opinion.

He should have been ready. He should have suspected something, but he'd gone up to the loft and dozed off, only waking to strange sounds in the barn. He'd rushed downstairs, and somehow stumbled over his own feet before he'd figured out that whoever it was had kryptonite.

Lots of it.

Ass loads of it, enough to kill Kal-El, and enough to put Kon on his ass.

Enough to make him wonder why and who, because Lex had been the only one with that kind of massive weapons grade arsenal of the shit, or so Conner had thought. Lex was in Metropolis.

It wasn't Lex.

He didn't, wouldn't, believe it. Didn't want to. Didn't think it could possibly be Bruce, even though Kon knew he had some of it. Maybe lots of it, but he wouldn't. Wouldn't do this, or maybe he would, but Tim wouldn't...

"Oh, look. This is interesting. This isn't any sort of human organ."

"Is it vital is the question? I assume this comes from his better half." Hah, hah, except not funny. Not funny when he just wanted to move, squirm, scream and pull free.

If they'd take away the kryptonite, he could. Even just a little, but he was pretty sure the restraints were laced with them, and the table underneath him. His blood felt like it was on fire, even if it didn't seem to be boiling out of him with each of their cuts. They were feeding something back into him, tubes, lines with stuff he could barely make out. Sure as hell not anesthetic. He wondered if Lex had felt this way. Trapped and in pain, and that made him wonder if it was the same people, part two, crazy shit possible to do to clones and no one else, except he wasn't built like that, wouldn't heal in hours. He could die, he was sure of it, and they seemed to be trying to see if he could. "I wonder what his outer limit will be."

"Let's give it a few hours. Let some of the damage from this heal while we write up our notes. I'm fairly certain she'll want to know, especially if the rumors about the other one are true."

"Do you think the other will come? Make this easier for us?" He didn't want to know, but he could guess.

"The original never made anything easy. This won't be, either. _She_ won't accept any excuses, though, so he'll be in the lab eventually. It'll be interesting to have two specimens."

Doors. Closing. Thank god for small favors, even if it felt like he'd been flayed alive and it wasn't getting any better. Didn't feel like it was healing, but then, he didn't. Not like Lex. Just faster than normal, and it still hurt like fucking hell.

Hurt enough that he couldn't rest. Couldn't move. Couldn't do anything except lie there and hope and pray.

Whether that was hoping and praying to die or be saved...

Even Conner couldn't know.

* * *

  
Hope hadn't found anything at the house. At least nothing that meant anything, nothing that made sense.

After a few more moments wasted on cursing, on considering kicking the wall, he pulled out his cell phone and headed to the loft. Conner kept Tim's number up there, and even with the place trashed, Lex would find it.

It didn't take long. It was tucked into the couch cushions, half-buried in a fleece blanket. Three missed calls, and the battery was low. Once he had it plugged in, he flipped through the address book until he found the entry and then dialed the number with his own.

_~"You realize that I'm a couple of time zones ahead of you, right? And that the sun sets early in Gotham?"~_

"Conner's missing." There wasn't any point in introducing himself, or putting anything in front of it. Tim clearly knew who he was before he'd answered the phone.

The sound that cracked over the connection was sharp, short. _~"What the hell do you mean Conner's missing? Conner's... Conner can't be missing."~_

"Conner's missing, and they broke Jonathan's leg. He's gone. I, we need your help." That was the best he could do, the best he could really say over the phone, given how important it was.

 _~"How long?"~_ He could hear noises in the background, the rush of air or something. Vague squeaks. _~"What time did he go missing? Have you called you-know-who?"~_

"Yes, and I don't know. I was out of town." Which had to look suspicious and would Tim think he was baiting him?

 _~"Lucky you. I wonder if whoever it was waited for that on purpose."~_ The air and the squeaking were replaced by beeps and the thrum of an engine. _~"I've been keeping an eye on the people who seemed the most fond of you. Nobody's made a move, and if they managed to get Kon, then clearly they know more than they should. That's a pretty limited pool of humans, L... Alex."~_

"Good. Good. Maybe when you get here we can start to work on who the most likely ones are. We have to find him." Hands down, Tim wasn't going to argue, and Lex knew that.

 _~"I'll be there within the hour."~_ Which was pretty good time, but the roar of that engine sounded serious. _~"And Alex? Keep your ass somewhere safe. Preferably with serious firepower. I'm not inclined to trust you to the death, but Kon is, and I'll take that."~_

"Thanks. That's good enough." As for safe, there wasn't really anywhere that was safe. Not the loft, not the castle, and he was sure he had a saferoom there, probably lined with kryptonite. Just the thought of it made him sick.

 _~"Within the hour. Keep one of your girl-goons with you."~_ A faint beep sounded, and then all sound was gone. Disconnected.

"Well?" Hope was watching him, watching the world, practically twitching she was so tense.

"He's on his way. He thinks it's a short list of people who would've, could've, made off with Conner." Lex wondered if old him had been on that list. And how many people who'd been fucking him were still, present tense, on that list?

"Then we've got to consider Talia Head. Bruce Wayne. The Contessa, if she escaped the barrage we sent against her, although I don't see how she could have." The frown she gave was sharp. "Then again, she's been known to create magical havoc. It's a possibility."

"Who's the contessa?" He was already read up on Talia Head, and had considered that a solemn duty to take care of.

That glance said things. Bad things. With capital letters. "Contessa Erica Alexandra Del Portenza. Your wife. Or. Well." She paused. "We thought we'd managed to kill her, but of the three I'd suspect her over the other two. They're all tough targets to take on, but Head's made her way East. We lost track of her for a while in Kazakhstan, but she's currently in Shenyang. It's possible she'd do it, but her attention's usually on the Bat."

"And I'm not the Bat." Lex rubbed at his face, and stood up, surveying the floor. The blood was still there, blood on the steps, nothing at all like coming up and seeing Conner hurt but all right. "Why would the contessa do that?"

"Well. We did kind of fuck her." We. It was nice of them not to lay all of that on him. He didn't know why they did that; it wasn't a kindness he was accustomed to receiving. "And there's the cloning process itself. She didn't know about me and Mercy, the backup units." Hope licked her lips and breathed in deeply. "But what you've got now must look a lot like immortality. And if she's got both of you, maybe it's easier to figure out with the right scientists."

"Retro engineer." Lex groaned a little. "No ex-wife of mine is going to take me apart for parts."

"She may already be taking apart your boyfriend. Assuming that's the right word, anyway." She had to know it was, even though it felt like a damn weird thing to hear. It wasn't as if he'd ever been reticent about the gender of the people with whom he found pleasure, it was only that he'd always dated women publicly. Dating Conner -- or more like spending time with him and making out -- was different than any of those things.

"Hopefully she hasn't gotten far." There wasn't much he could do in the meantime, was there? Except, maybe... Maybe. "What do I have on her?"

It wasn't any surprise, being presented with the tiny data chip. "Nothing since we thought she was dead, but that's most of it. I'm not sure the woman's ever had anything resembling a good intention."

And he'd married her. It wasn't the first time Lex noted that he'd been seriously, utterly unhinged, and he was sure it wasn't going to be the last time he observed it, either. "Thanks. I'll, uh. Let's go into the house." There were at least more entrances and exits there.

"When's your little friend flying in?" It didn't surprise him anymore, what they might or might not know. It seemed like Hope and Mercy knew everything. "From what I hear, he's a hell of a lot smarter than Big Blue. Found you faster, anyway."

"Now. He'll be here as soon as he can manage." Lex led the way down the stairs, holding tight to that chip. He could at least get read up and ready.

Her steps were firm, right behind him. "Then let's head back to the castle. Most of its shut off, but we have weapons there, and there aren't any here. I'd bet she knows this is where you're staying, and Lex? It'll be safer if we go."

"I can't argue that." Getting out of there seemed good, and the Kents were being protected. "He'll just have to find us when he gets into town."

Lex wondered if the other him had gotten snorts if derision, or if he was just less scary. Less crazy. "He'll know where we are before we make it there. I'm driving."

Probably the latter. It was hard even to think of trying to strike fear into those women's hearts. "Fine, let's go." Maybe he'd manage to find something in the fifty minutes or so left before Tim arrived, probably in some weird supersonic black airplane that would get just about anybody arrested outside of the comic books.

Not that death rays were any better. Lex let her take the keys again, and followed, trailing her towards his car. It was for the best that he wasn't driving, because he was shaky and strung out feeling. He spent most of the ride back wondering what the hell would possess him to get married again. Hadn't he figured out early on that marriage was a bad idea? People said that the third time was the charm, and it might be true. His third wife had nearly succeeded in killing him where the first two had failed, so why had he tried marriage a fourth time?

The worse thought was, how many times in between them had he been married? Maybe she wasn't the fourth. Maybe she was the sixth, or the seventh, and how fucked up and lonely was he? If he could make clones, why hadn't he just made one for himself? The sudden sick thought that maybe that was the point in Conner overwhelmed him. Kon-El, built to be everything that Kal-El never could be. Never would be. All the ways he and Clark had failed one another, and shit. Shit, was he really that sick?

"Stop thinking." The Diablo revved up and they were on the way, Hope not even looking at him. "Because yeah, okay, things got fucked up along the way, but you were... People never saw the good things you did, okay? You pulled us in off the street, and you made things right. Maybe there were shortcuts along the way, but apparently Super-Tight-Ass figured he was your conscience and usually busted whatever it was before it went too far. Mostly. So stop."

Maybe. Maybe he still was that sick.

"I don't know what I was thinking, except. That I was thinking something, I'd _planned_ something in all of this." And that the contessa taking Conner away from him wasn't in that plan. Would never be in the plan.

The car braked, turned, headed towards the castle. "Truth?" Hope glanced away from the road. "I don't know what you were planning. Neither does Mercy. What I think you were doing was going back to somewhere simpler. Sometime when you thought you were a better person. Sometime you were happier, and maybe even somebody you were happier with. I know how you think. Maybe not as much as Mercy does, because you've always been that way together, and I don't feel weird about that. But see, this isn't something you were plotting about, Lex. This is something you were hoping about."

"I want to believe that. I do." He needed time, a lot of it, to get to that point. He needed Conner back, and he still hadn't really wrapped his mind around everything that had happened. He needed Conner back.

Oh god.

He just. Needed.

"Here. Slip it under your tongue, and don't talk back to me about it."

"You both need to be sainted for putting up with me," Lex murmured, taking the tablet and closing his eyes. Fuck. He hated drugs for a reason, hated the loss of control, but the freakout spiral was worse on so many levels.

"Funny thing about saving somebody from hell, Lex. Turns out they'll walk through it for you later on and not flinch." Hope's mouth twitched. "Besides, it's not like we weren't both prepared for a freakout, just maybe not quite like this." She turned the car smoothly, and they were back at the castle. Much as he hated it, at least they were somewhere with weaponry.

"What were you expecting? Out of morbid curiosity?" And security. And control, and he did like his control.

They coasted to a stop and she turned off the car. "The minute when all of the crazy shit came crashing down. We lost you." She was staring straight ahead, not looking at him. "It took weeks. Weeks before the automated systems turned us out, before we found you. Anything could have happened. Anything _did_. You've got the right to freak out about it."

He tried very hard. Very hard not to think about what had happened. It was easier to pop the door open, and just get out. "When we get Conner back..."

"Then we'll make sure both of you are okay when you freak out." The car beeped, and she moved ahead of him, looking everywhere at once. He was starting to feel more calm, almost drifty. "C'mon. You can look at the data on the chip while I see what I can find."

"Thank you." After all, he was a new Lex, and he was going to have to repay them from an entirely different perspective than the last one.

Her sharp grin said things he couldn't quite read, but it was all right. He could deal with that. "Yeah. Now come on. You can sit. Boy wonder ought to be here any time. At least you can get started before he gets here."

* * *

  
It wasn't that he hadn't been looking for Luthor. It was just that things had been complicated, and he'd been busy. Bruce haunted Gotham looking for people to help.

They called out to Clark, worldwide it sometimes seemed, and he couldn't just turn it off. If he'd known, if he'd thought, if he'd... but the thing was he hadn't. He'd tracked it the way he did best, following the money, and he'd failed.

Conner was a different matter.

He didn't know how to feel about Conner half the time -- like a son he hadn't wanted, hadn't expected in his life, not his choice, but half his DNA. Half his and half Lex's, and maybe he'd been suspicious at first. Worried, because Luthor ran in the blood, no matter how much Conner looked like him, no matter how much he reminded Clark of himself. He'd felt guilty as hell about all of that, and he'd finally settled, helped Conner settle, too. Lois had pretty much kicked him in the ass about it for taking that long, and he'd deserved it.

And now Lex was in Conner's life, which of course meant that everything was tipped on its ass, and that they were all in danger. It just seemed to go with the territory.

Luthor was back, and Conner was missing. He'd wanted to shake Lex, demand to know what he'd done, because there was just no way, it was too coincidental. But there'd been something in his expression, and it was easier to leave, to go see his parents. Easier not to see that hot, desperate thing that Luthor -- Lex -- was too young to hide adequately behind his eyes.

Easier not to remember a time when maybe he'd helped push Lex over the edge into Luthor.

Instead, he'd gone to the Watchtower, hoping he could search through satellite feeds, maybe get a glimpse of whatever truck had been used. Maybe get a grip on where they'd take Conner, his not-son.

There were a lot of trucks in Smallville, but Clark was fast and he could whittle most of them down, place them to an owner and a location that matched where they should've been, which wasn't as helpful as it should've been because they all matched a location. No strange roving trucks, just Conner in one, and maybe held at a location that matched the truck.

LuthorCorp and LeXCorp had long since abandoned Smallville for greener pastures, but there were other corporations close by, both small and large. Most farming was corporate in the county these days, so he'd flown over the packing sheds and equipment facilities before he'd come up to the Watchtower. That only left a handful of trucks unaccounted for in all truth, and that was where he'd been stuck for a short time.

He reviewed his research, and then decided that there was still a corporate facility one county over that was sort of nested, shaded interestingly, the way he was used to corporations doing their dirty work. Worst he could do was check it out. It might yield something, it might not, and he could call for backup once he got there if it turned out that he needed it. Decision made, Clark left a message for J'onn and headed back to Earth.

The sooner he located Conner and found the people responsible, the better. Conner wasn't invulnerable, he could be injured, and his powers weren't fully developed. Never really would be. He was caught eternally in that awkward cusp Clark remembered at that age. Forever young, but not so completely invulnerable he couldn't die. It would take effort, the kind of effort Edge and others had made with Lex, and that made him twice as frantic to find him.

It had been years since Smallville's meteorites had been gathered up and refined into deadly green bars meant to hold Clark away from LeXCorp, from Luthor, so he was pretty sure he'd manage to get in, find out what they were hiding at the facility, and then get back out again without too much effort.

Even better if it was with Conner.

He had to move carefully but fast. Fast was the focus, get in and get out, undetected if possible. It felt almost like being a kid again, and he couldn't help the sharp grin that snuck over his mouth as he sped into the Landry Fertilizer and Mulch facility, slipping through the halls, carefully avoiding all of the workers on the upper floors. It only took a moment to reach the single elevator that went to the areas below ground and to slip inside without anyone noticing.

It all seemed far too easy, and he was used to that with Luthor sorts of traps. He was used to walking in and then getting it sprung, bait for a stupid mouse, like smearing peanut butter inside a trap. Problem was that he didn't believe it was Lex, and Luthor was dead, so there were only so many possibilities, and the majority of them seemed extraordinarily unlikely, mostly because they were all dead or dismembered. Well, or in Arkham, which definitely meant anyone in there was a possibility. The place leaked like a sieve.

Still. It didn't feel right, and he continued warily, pushing open a door that didn't seem to have any triggers attached to it. The smart thing to do would be to turn around, leave, return with backup. _If_ Conner was there, that would leave him at the mercy of whoever the hell had him, and Clark wasn't prepared to do that. Not now, not when he felt so close, not when....

Fuuuuck.

Fuck. He knew the feeling of kryptonite as soon as he felt it, but there was no safe early warning signal, and it confirmed that Conner was there. It made him want to get him out all the worse, but instead he did his best to back away, get out of range of it, shut the door.

"Going somewhere, Super Boyscout?"

"I've come for the boy. If you release him to me no one will be hurt." He liked to play it calm, cool, strong. He was going to continue that, because it was the only way to respond when his father had been hurt. When Conner, his half-clone, cousin, son, whatever, was somewhere in this facility, and they were probably doing very bad things to keep him there.

"Oh, Superman, Superman. I'm quite surprised at you." Surprised, maybe, but careful. Meticulous planning went a long way, he'd learned. "All I want is revenge, and I would have thought you'd gladly allow me that where Lex Luthor is concerned. I only need the boy for a short while, and then you can have him back."

"You don't get him at all. Luthor's dead." Which was true in at least one way. "Just hand him over, and I'll leave your building standing."

It surprised Clark a little when she rolled forwards, the sickness washing over him more thickly, making him stumble backwards. "Well, it was worth a try, wasn't it? Is that what you want me to say? Clearly you must think I'm as limited as, well. You, alien. As if I don't already know my dear widowed husband had himself cloned and resides a scant forty-three miles from here... with your parents, no less." The contessa laughed, and it sent the scars rippling across her face unpleasantly. "How are they, by the way? I did try to time it so that it was just the boy getting hurt, out of... consider it a kindness. Ah, well. Things don't always go according to plan, do they?"

He took a step backwards, towards the elevator, and he was going to have to leave, leave and come back for Conner, get someone who didn't have a weakness to kryptonite.

"Oh, don't run away so soon, Superman. You see, I already have one model upon which to experiment, but I do worry that he might expire if my scientists become too enthusiastic. You'll make a nice backup." With that statement, she flung out an arm, and a string of glowing green beads tangled at his feet, sending a throbbing wave of sick-sick-sick that made his blood boil in his veins.

He just needed traction, just needed to get to his feet, and out, burst through the door and fly. He could, would, he just. Needed to stand up, needed to hit the signal button for help.

"Gather him, gentlemen. You can put him in the lab we've prepared next to our primary acquisition. Perhaps you'd like to work on him while the boy... recovers."

Oh god.

He struggled, but he was being lifted, and the balls of kryptonite were being lifted with him. He needed a shield, a radiation shield, something to stop that horrible weakness, and he needed to get out, get help. Needed it now, but he'd have to accept it when it came because he'd been stupid. Not so stupid that he hadn't left a note, but he couldn't stop himself from groaning in agony because it would take time for the rest of them to get the message and to come.

At least he could be grateful for small favors. If they were experimenting on him, maybe they'd stop what they were doing to Conner for a while, and if that happened, then maybe both of them would come out of it alive.

* * *

  
He had absolutely married into Crazy, Lex decided when he was done going through the files on his ex-wife. Ex, deceased, whichever, it didn't really matter. Not so much as it mattered that she was clearly evil to the core, and some things didn't bear consideration at all.

"Okay, we've got a fair amount of traffic here. Most of it's illegal downloads, porn, that kind of thing. Local, you know?" Tim sat on the leather couch, looking like... Well, Lex just thought maybe there should be somebody giving out fashion advice for superheroes. "That's standard. We also have a fair amount of corporate traffic, healthcare databases, resupply, that kind of thing. However." He looked up. "There's been a distinct increase in traffic from Landry Fertilizer over the last month, and I've found some data trails that seem to be pointing towards attempted hacks here. I'd probably find traces at the Kent place, too."

And porn, and illegal downloads, Lex was sure. "Then that's our likely target. Interestingly enough, that's the plant I left to myself." Tim probably already knew that, he wasn't sure. Telling him couldn't make it so Tim would take it away.

"I put in a call to a couple of friends. We'll have some backup in the next fifteen minutes or so." Tim glanced over at Hope. He hadn't seemed all that surprised by the heavy artillery when he'd arrived, which said a lot for him. "If I said keep him here, would you be able to do it?"

"Maybe. I think I'd be more useful on the ground."

"I'm not going to wait patiently for someone else to bring Conner home." Lex closed his laptop, eyeing the garish guy on the couch. He was immortal. He couldn't _die_.

And he was going.

"It's your choice, but I've been thinking on the way over. If your ex-wife just wanted Conner, why'd she leave the Kents there and mostly okay? Why wasn't somebody waiting for Superman to show up?" Tim leaned back. "It's a trap, set and sprung just for you. She's baited it with something you want back, and now she's just waiting for you to set it off."

"Would I have gone before?" He looked to Hope. "The other me."

That grim smile probably made grown men shudder and grow pale. "Right behind me and Mercy."

"Then she really is expecting me. Why disappoint?" He tilted his head watching Tim. Red Robin. Whoever he was. Lex had always read comics, had loved Warrior Angel since the first time his mother had laid one in his hands. He was fairly certain that he'd never considered the multiple personality angle of things much more seriously than he did these days, though.

Tim sighed. "All right, but if she shoots you in the head right in front of Conner and it fucks him up worse than he probably already is by now, we're gonna have words."

"After my head grows back. That's not actually a threat that scares me at this point." He had a lot worse things to have nightmares over. "Are we calling for backup, or are we going in stupid and unarmed?" Arming himself seemed like a good idea, and not entirely unnecessary, though it was a shame that his first introduction to his new business was going to involve a fire fight.

That grin right there was probably scarier than anything Lex had seen in the last hour or so. "Oh, we're going in armed to the teeth. I..."

"Oooo, sandwiches." The blur came a stop, dark hair waving wildly. "So, you know where we're going yet? Also, I talked to Cassie. She's on the way, even if she'd kinda rather boot Conner's new boyfriend in the head and stuff. Which," he continued, mouth full, "all things considered, shows a considerable amount of restraint on her part, I think."

"Hello." He squinted at the blur, because he was sure he should've known its name, but.

"Hey, dude. You look tons better, and seriously, have a sandwich, right?" Coming from that skinny grinning person, he probably did need one.

"Bart." Tim sounded so patient. "How far behind is she?"

Bart waved a hand. "Ought to be here anytime."

Lex moved towards the far wall of the library, gesturing Hope over with his eyes. "Armory hasn't moved?"

"Not this week anyway." She chambered a round, and the sound brought a rush of air.

"Hey, hey. Are we gonna kill people this week? I don't know that I really wanna kill people this week. Guns are dangerous. Then again, people have Kon. How do people even _get_ Kon? Nobody said, and I was in a hurry."

Lex reached out, and lifted the book that would scan his thumbprint. Maybe it didn't work that way anymore, but he was going to try and puzzle through it. "They attacked him at home. I wasn't there to see."

"Yeah, but..." It was surprising when he stopped and seemed to think. "Huh. Okay. And that really bothers you. Not that I blame you, it'd bother me, too, just thinking about it. But do we really have to shoot people?"

Tim's voice drifted over from the couch. "These people know Kon-El's weakness and they know where he lives. The short answer is yes. The long answer is let's try and get them permanently committed someplace not Arkham."

"The shortest answer is _'I thought I already killed this one once. I'll get it right this time'_." Thumbprint still worked, left hand only, though, where before it had been both, which was handy when he was holding something. Huh, well. He'd find out what that was about.

"Dude. Harsh." The door to the armory unlatched quietly in front of him. "Hey, Lex? Alex, whatever. I think maybe you ought not to do that. Hey, scary lady, can I have a minute alone with our bald friend here?" Lex didn't turn around to look.

Hope snorted. "Touch him funny, I'll break your arm."

"Right. Gotcha."

Guns and his ownership of them certainly hadn't remained in the time warp taste of his cars. It made a certain sense that he'd want his replacement to have the best weaponry possible if it came to a situation of that sort. He started to step into the armory, halfway to touching a dozen things that looked laser equipped, suits, protective gear.

Prosthetic hand was interesting. He wondered what it did, if it did anything at all.

"So." Bart was looking around thoughtfully. "See, I think I need to explain here that I don't think you're on some magical set path in the world to bad things, although I think the choices you make take you to all kinds of different places and not all of them are good. And it's not that I'm discounting your choice of killing the old Luthor's dead-but-not-really wife or anything, either. It's something else, and I think Kon'd be more likely to agree with me than Tim about it, and that's..." He took a deep breath and then he was there, next to Lex, face serious. "So, Conner wouldn't want you to kill anybody over him. I mean, he'd understand and all if you did, and if you're going, then going armed is totally the way to go, you're not super-powered or anything, well, except the healing thing, but that's not offensive, right. But don't kill somebody for Conner out of anger. It wouldn't do you any good, and maybe when it's all said and done, he's gonna need you to be there and not, you know, any more fucked up than you already were before."

"Do you always talk this much?" He picked up the interesting pair of what looked like force field generators, and wondered what on earth had inspired him to make them bright purple. It was hard to get campier.

The skinny speed-guy stepped up and poked the prosthetic hand. "Sometimes more, but right now, it's important that you listen to me, and really listen. If that means talking fast, hey. It's what a guy does for his friend. Do you think the fingers open up and it shoots out laser rays?"

"I think it might turn around and strangle you." Lex slipped the force field generators onto his wrists, and pulled the fabric of his shirt down to cover them. The design, while he fussed with them, felt oddly natural, intuitive. "How many times did I fight you people to a draw?"

"More like how many times did you do that and then end up getting off on a technicality. Old you was pretty smart sometimes. Wally swears it drove Supes nuts, which, hey. I can see where it would." He noted the way Bart stepped away from the hand. "So, anyway, did I do okay with the talking or are you still planning on killing people with extreme prejudice?"

"I want Conner back. I know I thought I was setting myself up for a better life, but there were glitches and I don't actually have much except Hope, Mercy, and Conner." And god, why did his bodyguards have those names? Hadn't somebody mentioned another one, Faith or something? He activated one of the wrist things, and aimed it at the far wall on a hunch. The burst of pressure was satisfying. "Are things like this standard in current tech, or am I still ahead of the curve?"

"Uh. Wow. Ahead of the curve mostly? Because nobody's ever ahead of the Batman. Which, by default, means most of the Gotham crew. But seriously, you're not gonna go in gunning specifically for somebody, right?" And if he sounded hopeful, well.

Everybody was young once.

"Yes, and I know where they acquired their recent burst of tech from, so that doesn't surprise me. I'm going in to get Conner out. These," and he held his wrists up, "aren't guns, but force field generators. Offensive and defensive."

That grin wasn't as bright as Conner's, but it still made him feel stupidly good. "See. You are just as smart as they say. That is so awesome." Then he was gone again, in the blink of an eye, even if Lex heard him talking about the sandwiches in the other room.

He looked around for a moment, searched through the impressive array of weapons. If a man ever had to be stranded in his house in a natural disaster, the Luthor mansion wasn't going to be undefended, apparently. And if the Luthor mansion deserved that much, the Luthor boyfriend sure as hell did.

In a flash, that thought caught at him. The Luthor boyfriend. That wasn't really what Conner was. He was Lex's boyfriend. Not the Luthor boyfriend. That changed things. He wasn't sure how, but it did, and so he frowned down at the closest weapons, contemplating exactly that until Hope's voice broke into his thoughts.

"Hey. Their blonde friend is here. We should get going."

He still grabbed a gun, tucked it into his waistband on a whim because he'd done that before, but he wasn't even sure if it was loaded. It was a decoy, if nothing else. He could use it and distract from what he was actually using. "All right. Let's get him back."

There weren't any other options available. It was get him back or die trying, until the bitch had to hack him to bits and scatter the pieces to the far end of the world to keep him from coming after her.

* * *

  
He was dying.

Maybe it was an exaggeration. Probably it was, because he didn't age. He was at least semi-invulnerable. Dying had never been on the list.

He'd never had anything like this done to him, though.

He was bleeding, or leaking, or oozing. It was like serum from a wound, but it was coming out of his side and he was sure they'd cut something important out at least in part to see what would happen, and holy fuck that hurt. Hurt, hurt, hurt, so that all he could think about was the pain, the way his blood kept trying to curdle from the kryptonite-laced needles holding him open, slipping into his veins to give blood or saline or fucking poison for all he knew.

Maybe he just wanted to die. Dying would be easier than waiting for rescue that wasn't going to come, easier than this. Anything would be better than this.

"I hear they're having a harder time next door."

"Oh, yeah. This one's got a fairly regulable reaction to the meteorite and the equipment. The alien's blood nearly boiled out from the first slice. They had to go back to the drawing board altogether. She's not happy about it, either."

Next door. Next door was bad, next door they had another one, someone else, who was reacting badly to meteorites, and that didn't take a rocket scientist. First person who'd go looking for him was Tim, but after that was Clark. If the pain hadn't been enough to make him want to die, the guilt was. Jesus, Clark had been married a short eternity, they were talking about adopting and shit, and instead he was next door being tortured because Conner was too stupid to escape the mad scientists who'd decided to take him apart.

A stabbing pain made him scream silently behind the ball gag they'd shoved in his mouth earlier. He wasn't sure why they even bothered; he'd stopped being able to scream days ago. Weeks ago. However long he'd been here, it felt like decades.

"He's stopped recovering as quickly. We could take another break."

He needed to be able to get himself out of those situations, needed not to need Clark to come save his stupid ass and fail. He needed to be harder, more ready, not less ready.

"All right. Let's let that close up, and we'll see what happens."

Oh thank God. Thank God, thank God, thank God, and if he had any moisture left anywhere in him, Conner thought he'd cry. Thought he wouldn't be able to stop it because he just wanted so much to be better than this. To be able to fight back and get up and save himself, save Clark, go home. Go anywhere that wasn't here.

"Sure, I've still got a sandwich in the... hey, what the hell are you doing in here?"

"Lights out!" There was glee, and then there was hearing Bart, and the smack of someone's head hitting a wall or the floor or Conner didn't care where because Bart was good to hear. Good enough that he seemed to find moisture someplace because his eyes were dripping, hot turning cold as the tears trickled down. "Hey. Hey, Kon. It's gonna be okay, all right?"

He wanted to believe that. He wanted to believe a lot of things, but they wouldn't be if they'd brought Lex, because his crazy bitch of a wife was here. Fingers worked at the buckle on the gag, and Conner gasped when it came loose, nearly choking. Fuck. Fuck. Air, air and his jaw not being locked in place had never felt so damn good, so damn hard to breathe and so damn good to be free. "Now to get the rest of it undone and we can join the fight before the fight even happens and get Supes out of here, too."

"ssss." All he could do, make stupid whispery, breathy sounds. "eeessss. ooooh."

"Seriously, it's gonna be fine. I'm. There are these boxes, and..." Closed. As soon as Bart thought about it, and Conner moaned in pleasurable agony because he was still flayed open in places, down his side, and he wasn't sure which was which. "Okay, so I've read through most of the medical library now, and I don't want to hurt you worse, but Kon. I'm going to need to close up some of this, okay?"

What the fuck. Why not. It had to be done.

He had no idea what he could do, what he should do, except close his eyes, take a deep breath, shaking, and nod to Bart and hope it didn't hurt half as much coming back together as it had coming apart.

Fast.

So fast, and he did scream then, a sound that was pure air, blood pounding in his ears so heavily Conner wasn't sure if he passed out or not. When he managed to come to, it was to the realization that the pounding wasn't in his ears, it was on the door.

"Oh, shit, hold on, I just need time, you're time dependent in a way..." In a way Bart wasn't used to, and Conner didn't care what it was, because he heard the door open and shut and then there was more pain. He was never, ever going to get used to that, and he was going to avoid it forever if he managed to live through this.

"Okay, you think you're mobile?" No, no way in hell, except Bart was getting him upright and he was going to be mobile come hell or high water.

Conner licked his dry lips with his dryer tongue and stood, knees nearly buckling the second his feet hit the floor. Bart held him up, and things squished unpleasantly inside of him like he never thought he'd know about. "Ssssuperman." He forced the whisper out through his lips. "Nesssdoor."

"Okay, we can get him. He heals fast, just...." Just there was a thud at the door and if Bart opened it, Conner was afraid of what was behind it, afraid to see what was waiting to finish them off.

The sound of the locks coming undone sounded, and the door swung open with a sickeningly familiar squeal. It wasn't even all the way open when a voice spoke from the other side. "I'm going to kill her."

Oh god. They brought Lex.

They shouldn't have brought Lex. Lex was all fucked up, he was worse fucked up than Conner was now, and Lex didn't. He didn't need to see this shit. He didn't need to see what they'd done, and when Conner stumbled, there were arms everywhere, out to catch him, and shit exploding in the distance. That or his heart was bursting, he wasn't all that sure.

"We'll get you outside, Conner. And Superman, before we level the building." Lex, Lex holding him up, Lex there to rescue him, and Bart was gone but that was okay, that meant he was getting the room next door and maybe they'd get out of there before Lex did kill her.

It wasn't like he cared. If they killed her, he just didn't think it was all that important. Maybe it was, but clearly she'd had him cut open, experimented on, was doing the same to Clark, so why not? "'sahight." It really was, more or less. Clark might not think so, but then, he was nicer than Conner about things like that.

The ripple of another bomb going off shook the room, and he saw Bart's head whip around as if he had x-ray vision. "That wasn't one of ours. Hold him up, I'll be right back."

"Sorry. We can't be sitting ducks, and I can't follow living ADD's directions." He had an arm around Conner's waist, holding him tight and close, and it hurt like hell, but they were moving. He just didn't feel where the extra support was coming from.

Bart was a great guy, an awesome guy, and sometime later, Conner would tell him all about it. Not right now, though, because he was graying in and out, and shit was exploding everywhere, and....

"Well, well, well. Still following around the pretty dark-haired boys and dragging them down with you, Lex."

"This would be better if I actually knew who you were." Lex was saying that, and Conner wasn't sure why or what it was going to accomplish but bought time and okay, that was a lot. Particularly with Bart around.

The woman laughed, and it cracked out like something out of _Wizard of Oz_. Double-you-tee-eff, lady. "I know you're lying, Lex. You're born of lies and you'll be nothing more even once you're dead."

"I know I pissed you off at some point, but that's a long list, and you should start from the back of the line," Lex offered, working Conner sideways a little, still moving forward like they were going to slip between her and the wall.

"Pissed me off!?" The question echoed back from the walls, underscored by an explosion close by. "You tried to kill me, Lex! And I'm here to return the favor."

Oh god. That was a big gun, a very big gun, and he made a faint gurgle of sound, trying to get in front of Lex because that was what he did. What he was, and he was feeling a little better now, maybe, even if shit was all fucked up inside. Better enough to protect, and wait a minute. What made her think she could kill Lex, anyway?

"We just want to leave." And Lex was pulling out a gun, he knew it, he saw it, no idea where it had come from but there it was in Lex's left hand. The incongruous thought that it was kind of hot skittered through Conner's mind and then ran away to hide in a deep, dark corner.

"I'm afraid that won't be possible, Lex. Not until I know enough to fix what you've done to me."

"What I did to you?" That was a funny twist to Lex's voice, new to Conner, and he wondered what it meant. Maybe he'd shoot her and be done with it after all, and then they could go home.

He really wanted to go home.

"Hey, what'd I.. ooo, scary lady. Tim said we should look out for you." Look out, and clearly smack her in the head so hard she fell over in her chair.

Maybe he ought to propose to Bart or something.

"Thank you." Lex looked over his shoulder, lowering the gun but not putting it away. "I've got hold of Conner if you want to secure the crazy bitch."

"Crazy bitch secured. Also, wait..." Loud bangs followed. "Awesome. Locked up in that hole they had Kon in. Hey, Batman!"

Conner so wasn't prepared for this kind of rescue. Not that he wasn't grateful, but damn. Just... damn.

"So, Mercy and Hope are going to get this floor dismantled," Lex murmured, and they were walking again, Lex pulling Conner forwards, hopefully towards the elevator. "And we'll get you home."

God, he loved Lex.

It slapped him in the face a little, that realization. He'd known he liked Lex, wanted him, wanted things to reach that point, but Lex had walked into hell to come get him when he didn't have to, and Conner felt himself grinning even as the world spun black at the edges from pain and disorientation. "Lesss." His arm tightened around Lex's shoulder, and he sighed.

"Just hold on." He closed his eyes, and just gave up because he needed to, needed to just...

* * *

  
Nothing hurt.

It was the first thought Clark had when he came to, and he opened his eyes to find himself staring up at the familiar space of his berth in the Watchtower.

The fact that he felt all right was a good sign. He hadn't remembered much past Luthor's crazy bitch of a not-really-dead wife trying to experiment on him, well, that or have him killed. They both felt a lot alike, truth be told. He vaguely remembered being rescued but beyond that, not much. The kryptonite exposure had been... difficult. The ore had been particularly well-refined, probably part of Luthor's stock, and things had gotten unpleasant.

He tested his ability to move, and considered sitting up to find out, before he stretched out his hands. He was well enough to do that, and maybe it was a good idea to see how much time he'd lost.

Slowly, Clark pushed himself up, sitting on the edge of his bunk. Things still didn't feel that great -- his blood pressure had probably gone stroke-high at the closest kryptonite exposure -- but he always bounced back, mostly good as new. A trip to the Fortress would help, once he managed to find out what was going on.

The blip of the comm sounded. _~"Clark. Are you awake?"~_

Questions like that were always funny, strange, because he wondered how waking a person up made that a good question. Even if it was coming from Nightwing. "Yes. I'm awake. Sort of." Mostly. He wasn't okay yet, but he was present and accounted for. "Can someone fill me in on what's happened?"

 _~"You and Kon are both secure and safe here. We uh. Brought Luthor."~_ There was a sort of hesitance when he said that. _~"He wanted to stay with Kon."~_

"That's fine." And it was. Sort of. Things had been different with Lex and Conner, not the same as it had been with them. Maybe... well. There was no point in rehashing history. "Where is Kon?"

 _~"Still in the medical center."~_ Medical center, like it wasn't a halfassed butcher's shop most days. Clark stood up shakily and got his bearings. He was alive, and they'd come for him.

"How long?" Because time had long since gone pear-shaped. "I want detailed information about..." About everything. Whatever experiments they'd run, what they'd done to him, just everything.

Everything. _~"About four hours. We're not sure when you were abducted. Uh, Luthor, Tim, and Bart went in for Conner, and contacted us later than I would've liked..."~_ And they hadn't actually gone looking for Clark.

He'd bitch if he wasn't damn grateful that somebody had gone looking one way or another. "And how bad is it?"

The long stretch of silence set his nerves on edge.

 _~"We're going to be learning the full breadth of Kon's recuperative capabilities,"~_ Nightwing said after a moment. _~"Why don't you come out and see. He's been sterilized of the kryptonite."~_

Shit. Shit, fuck, damn, a litany of curses that would have his mother washing out his mouth with soap even at his age. "I'll be right there." Maybe not as fast as normal, but he managed to drag himself up. Managed to pull on a spare pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt before he headed out, padding barefoot towards the medical bay.

It wasn't his usual bold front, but he hurt, bodily hurt, and they were safe or at least in a safe place for the time being. He didn't need to rush out and save the world in red and blue. Not for a few minutes, and if the world was in luck, not for a good day or so.

The sound of footsteps falling in just behind him didn't surprise him too much. "Bruce. Dick didn't seem to want to tell me everything. Would you like to be a little more forthcoming?" Preferably before he got to the med center and saw what was going on.

"He'll heal." That wasn't more forthcoming. "I should be surprised that they mounted an attack without us, but I'm not."

"At this point, I'd say you've trained a loose cannon. They seem to be pretty effective for all of that, though. What do you mean by he'll heal, anyway? Specifics, Bruce." Clark paused and frowned back at him. He was still wearing the mask and cape, which wasn't all that surprising. "Do I need to take him to the Fortress?" The medical center was good for sewing up gashes and setting bones, not something more invasive.

"He could benefit from it. His injuries were such that the Smallville hospital was unrealistic and not a viable option." That was bad. That was bad, that told Clark a lot of what he'd see when he saw Conner in person.

Nothing he wanted to see. "I'll get dressed before going further then. If you'll provide me with all of the information, we'll leave immediately." Somehow.

"I think it can wait until you've healed. I was reluctant to make Luthor leave." He still was, and he'd brought him to the Watchtower.

"You? Reluctant?" Then again, Clark had been the asshole about things, and he was aware of it. "Why?"

"I'm reluctant to discourage a positive aspect of his personality. Intentions, if you will." He was pretty sure he would discourage intentions, actually, all by himself.

Swallowing, he looked away. "I've been thinking. About the things that happened, about the things that didn't. About what might have happened if things had been different. Do you think sometimes we make the enemies we're looking for?" The enemies they thought they deserved.

"Occasionally." Bruce's voice pitched towards angrier than usual behind the cowl, and Clark wondered quite what he was thinking about because it wasn't being at war with Lex Luthor.

Sometimes, he felt stupidly young standing next to Bruce. It was one of those moments now, standing there and thinking that Lex Luthor, evil genius, probably didn't measure up to the Joker for crazy. Probably. "I don't think Kon's going to screw things up the same way I did." Maybe different ways, or maybe not at all. He sure as hell hoped not, because he suspected that he wouldn't take no for an answer when Clark took Conner to the Fortress.

"No, maybe not." If Bruce had any part in that or any regrets himself, he wasn't saying. Luthor was sort of a group screwup, from what Clark remembered, but that was maybe a little blame shifting.

If he'd felt guilty about all of the head injuries before, it was kind of twice as bad in that moment. Heaving a sigh, Clark started moving again, feeling heavy, tired. Old, even if he didn't look as old as he was. He halfway wondered if whatever genetic twist made him look twenty-seven when he was closer to forty-five was responsible for the fact that Conner didn't age. "I'm guessing they cut him up pretty bad for all of you to be avoiding talking about it."

"Dick said it reminded him of an alien autopsy." Not that Bruce would ever admit to having watched anything like that. Just hearing it aloud made Clark want to puke, for so many reasons.

"How did...."

"Impulse."

Of course. Speed reading clearly had a lot of applications, but it still made Clark sick. "Does he need...?"

"I think we need to consider sending someone to medical school." It was almost an idle threat, but Bruce pushed open the door to the medical bay, and there was Kon. Cleaned up, and unconscious, an oxygen mask covering his nose and mouth. There didn't seem to be anything else, but that was bad enough. He was so white he seemed practically see-through, and on the opposite side of the bed was Lex.

Clark could barely remember a time when Lex looked like that -- young and scared and traumatized, and he only knew there had been a time like that because he'd been there. He'd been there, and he'd been young and fucked up, too, but completely unwilling to be anything but obsessed with his own problems. He'd created a lot of them himself. Like Lex, who just looked tired and hurting and fucked up. That seemed to be the theme for the evening.

"Hi." Softly spoken, because it seemed the right thing to do. At the moment, he felt a hell of a lot less Superman and more Clark. Maybe it was time to _be_ Clark. If Bruce could try not to act like an obsessive ass, he could do the same. "How are you?" He didn't ask how Conner was. That was pretty clear.

He really expected the sideways suspicious look he got. "Fine. I'm surprised you're up already."

Clark was pretty surprised, too. "The older I get, the faster I heal." And Conner would never gain that ability. "In a few hours, I'll take him back to Earth. To... I can hopefully make the healing process faster." It didn't look as if he'd last that long, truthfully.

"Can you? Can't you do that now?" No, and if he thought he could make it there with Kon in one piece, he would. "Why don't any of you have _doctors_?"

That was a great question, one he'd been asking himself since he regained consciousness. "Most of us... I have no idea." Most of the Justice League was made up of metahumans. As a whole, they tended to avoid doctors. "Batman... well. But we ought to consider sending someone to medical school." Someone who wouldn't want to do things like this to a living, breathing being, and Clark reached down, gently brushed the limp, sweaty curls off of Conner's forehead. "I'm not in the best shape just yet. I want to be sure we get him there safely." Without causing anything worse to happen.

"I could probably program Mercy with the training." It was an odd thing to say, but he was looking at Conner and not Clark when he said it.

"...program." That. That right there, he had no idea what Lex's mad genius mind was cooking up, but he was better off not asking some things. Maybe that was what he had to do to change -- to give them all a chance to be less crazy, something better than enemies. "I think maybe it's better to do it the old-fashioned way. After all. Impulse has the knowledge." Clark was afraid to look under the sheet and see just how bad things were.

Lex looked sideways at him again. "They're wet-wired. I cloned them so many times that I started to build in improvements. That shouldn't surprise you."

No. Not really, although he wondered if it had surprised this Lex. This person who wasn't Luthor at all, and Clark felt something go surprisingly loose and hot and sorrowful in his chest. It stunned him, that sorrow for things that never were and never would be. "No. No, I suppose it doesn't."

A faint whimper made him look down at Conner again, surprised that his hand was still there, brushing back his hair.

"He's done that a few times, but he hasn't woken up." Lex was going to stay there until he woke up and after. He had gone looking for Conner, gone with help to rescue him. Clark nodded, and wasn't surprised when he looked down and realized that Lex was holding Conner's hand underneath the sheet.

"It'll be another hour. Maybe two. Then we'll go." There wasn't any point in having an argument he was going to lose anyway. Lex wouldn't let Conner go anywhere that he didn't. Clark would just have to be careful about making sure he couldn't figure out where they were, somehow.

That he couldn't come back, wreck the place. He could blindfold him, and hope that he didn't manage to destroy anything or infect his fortress with a virus while he was there. "Okay." Lex went back to looking at Conner, and yeah, he probably didn't want to talk to Clark.

Gently, he pulled his hand away from Conner and turned away to glance up at the observation area. There were several people standing there, most of them dwarfed by the personal shadow Bruce seemed to carry around with him. He decided that it was time to go ahead, start getting things in order. He'd need to make plans to get Kon-El to the Fortress safely, to get him into a nutrient bath that would hopefully keep him alive and heal him completely. It would be slow, but it was better than needing the regeneration matrix.

Where there was life, there was hope, and Conner, Kon-El, he'd hang onto that. Clark believed it.

* * *

  
Clark had gone to great pains to make sure that Lex had no idea where they were going. The blindfolding had been a little over the top, but he supposed the other him had earned that sort of time-wasting, fearful avoidance. He was just glad when Clark took Conner to the alien version of a medical bay.

He got the feeling that he was expected to stand right there until Clark came back, not moving, not touching anything, but he couldn't. He wouldn't, and so he followed after them, infinitely quiet on his feet. There were small golden robots rushing everywhere, and a bubbling glass-sided tub in the center of the wide room. Strangely firm white mist billowed up from the floor and formed a slab beside it. Clark laid Conner out and began gently tugging at the ties of the ridiculous cotton covering they'd put on him before they'd left. It was covered in things Lex knew too much about and didn't want to consider, inner bodily fluids that had leaked through the gauze bandages wrapped around him. When Clark reached for those as well, he found himself making a faint noise as if to protest.

The way Clark leaned in and looked at him was surprising, made him swallow hard. "They have to come off. I can't put him in with them on, or as he heals, it will stick into the flesh."

He closed his mouth, and folded his arms over his chest, leaning in a little just to make sure Conner was all right. Even if he didn't want to see the blood, the serum, the patches of skin that met jaggedly. "Will it account for Impulse's stitches?" Uneven and black, sewn inside and out with silk thread from god alone knew where and kryptonite-laced needles. Just the thought of it made him want to be sick.

"I hope."

Hope wasn't enough. Lex wanted promises, and he reached out his hand to cup Conner's cheek just below the oxygen mask. That would have to come off, too, and he didn't want that moment where Conner wasn't quite breathing before he was immersed in the bath. He didn't interfere, because Clark knew how to use his own damn tech, or so Lex was going to have to assume.

Tense moments spread, Conner shuddering every so often as he was moved or touched, moaning aloud. Once, Lex thought he saw the faintest slit of bruise-blue eyes looking at him, and then he had to wonder if he'd imagined it because there was nothing there but the fan of dark lashes over thin pale skin.

"Lex." When Clark spoke, it wasn't Clark. It was that other, alien voice, strong beyond belief and scary as hell. "You need to step back now."

Wondering why that was important, he did step back, even if he didn't want to. Why he needed to move away, but he stayed... ready, Lex supposed, poised to strike if there was something he needed to do to help Conner.

He didn't think Clark would hurt him. There was an edge to that thought, as if he wasn't entirely sure, and when the wires and tubes came up out of the bath as Clark gently pulled the oxygen mask away, he found himself making a choked noise of protest. A half-step forward, and it was too late, because there were tubes up his nose, down his throat, sliding into intimate parts of him, and the white mist changed in its alien-solid way, helping to propel him into the glass tub and then shifting to rest atop it, sealing him inside as more liquid gushed in, displacing the remaining air. He half-thought that Conner was going to drown, but that was probably why the tubes had come up. Feeding him air, anything else he needed, just like the oxygen mask had. "Shit." Shit, and he put his face in his cupped hands because he didn't know what else to do.

It was a surprise, the feeling of Clark's hand on his shoulder. Lex shook hard when that touch fell on him, but he couldn't bring himself to look up. "Conner. He'll be in there for a while, Lex. You should get some rest."

Clark probably should, too, because he still looked... not as good as he could, Lex supposed. Not as alive, not quite right. He pulled away a little. "I don't sleep well. I'd rather stay here and wait."

For a moment it even seemed as if he'd get away with it. "The temperature needs to drop for it to work properly, to combat the heat the bath will generate. Conner will be fine in here, but you won't. I... you need to eat, and I'm too tired to fight you on this."

He only felt that his jaw was clenching when he opened his mouth to speak and felt the twinge of pain in front of his ear. "Fine. How long will it take?" He moved away from the tank, away from Conner's limp, floating body. Away from Clark and that heavy hand.

"Honestly? I don't know. Days, maybe. It all depends on Conner, in the long run. He's... I know things haven't been right between us for a long time. You and me. The old you and me. But Conner's strong. And he's going to be fine." Clark shook his head. "You just need to be patient."

"Patience isn't one of my strong suits." He'd always been headstrong, quick to act, quick to rush in. He could plot and scheme, but in the heat of the moment he had trouble controlling himself, trouble not-acting. It was possible that everything that had happened had just made it worse. "It's my fault he's hurt."

That sigh reminded him of Jonathan. "It's nobody's fault. Somebody would have gotten the idea eventually. They usually do. There's something about an alien autopsy that seems to make humans incredibly curious." So bitter. Sharp. "It never seems to bother them that the aliens might object to it."

"It's not a treatment they reserve just for aliens." He kept his arms crossed over his chest, as if to keep out the cold, as if it would keep him together while Conner was healed, worked on. One last look back, and he didn't know if he could survive this. Not really.

The touch of Clark's hand on him again, between his shoulder blades, made him jump hard. "No. You're right. It isn't. I'm sorry for implying that it was and... I'm sorry that I didn't make finding you a higher priority. I should have asked for help."

"I went through that for two months." The sharp thought was present that he should've left Clark there. He should've, except there was a benefit to Conner that he was all right, and he didn't want to see the Kents mourning. "I've been amputated, burned, sliced, fucked, skinned alive, I'm sure somewhere in there I've had a kidney or two taken."

The temperature was dropping rapidly, and he shuddered in reaction. Clark didn't seem uncomfortable at all, except in reaction to Lex's words. "I should have asked for help," he said again. "And I apologize for that. Come with me now. You need to eat, and you need to rest, for when..." Green eyes glanced back at the container. "He'll want you to be all right when he's out."

The problem was that he really wasn't all right. Going to get Conner back had been the most together, the most focused he'd been. Mostly, Hope and Mercy probably thought he was playing house with the Kents. They had said as much once or twice and it was hard to express just how much was wrong, wasn't working. He'd latched onto Conner like a lifeline, and now his lifeline needed one himself.

He half-moved to follow Clark out of the room, still looking over his shoulder at Conner. However long it took, he'd be there. Maybe a little crazy. Maybe a lot crazy. But he'd be there.

Maybe if he held onto that, he'd even manage to keep that self-made promise.

* * *

  
Liquid.

Everywhere.

Golden, and full of bubbles, all around him, and god, Conner felt so much fucking better. Tender still, messed up, probably, but almost human. All things considered, he'd take that.

There was a sound, a thunk, and when he looked up, whatever had been white up above him had taken a trip elsewhere. He could feel himself being lifted, and things were tugging in hellaciously awkward places. Just odd little thin wiry tugs that he couldn't entirely place, but then he felt something sliding out of his throat and his nose, and that was awful and induced choking. By the time he came to full awareness of where he was, he was leaning over the side of whatever tube he'd been in, hacking up liquid all over the place.

Fantastic.

That was no fun, he thought, limbs heavy, shivering in the ice cold air. It hurt to breathe, and he wasn't sure he had the energy required to pull his ass out of the tube. Besides, it was warm in there, and the whole climbing out thing promised that his balls would probably be creeping up to the point that his whole kit and tackle would crawl up inside and he'd suddenly have a vagina, the idea of which made him laugh and cough up a little more liquid. It felt like he'd been breathing, and swallowing the shit, and he had no idea how that worked except magical science, and oh god. The fact that everything was sore and weird was horrible and a relief all at once because there was no sharp pain.

"Conner?"

Somehow, he managed to drag his head up, and oh.

Oh, that was. That was good. There was Lex, looking all fragile and fucked up, and he'd never seen anything more completely gorgeous and welcome. "Huh-hey." Hey, and he couldn't keep from grinning even as he sputtered again. "Help me outta here?"

"I thought you were never going to come out of there." It didn't sound like it was a figure of speech. Lex was crossing the space in no time, a brisk walk, and then he was sliding an arm under Conner's arm, behind his back.

"'m coming out." He couldn't help sputtering out a laugh at that. "Yeah. That's. Oh god, I." He'd wanted Lex so much, and for a second, he almost crumbled. Almost, and then there were other hands, and Clark was helping to pull him out, and crap. He was totally ass-naked in front of _Clark_.

Awkward.

Not that it lasted long, because Lex was sliding the other arm around him, bear hugging him from the front which was an entirely different kind of awkward but better. At least as far as Clark couldn't look at his junk, which he probably didn't want to do.

He felt honey-sticky, and he was probably getting Lex covered in whatever shit that was, but he didn't care. Clearly Lex didn't either, and so that was all good. All right, perfect, and he barely felt it when Clark put something around him, warm, soft, clean. "You'll, ah. Need a bath. And possibly some help to get it. How are you feeling?"

Nothing hurt. "Like a ten minute old foal." All wobbly legs and weirdness.

"This smells a little more pleasant than afterbirth. Clark has food-substance ready for you after we get you clean." Lex moved a little, patting the blanket against his skin, still half-hugging him.

"Food-substance? No shit?" Just hearing that made Conner want to giggle. He was... it was a little like being high, except all over the place. "Hi. Hi, Lex." Like it was vital for him to say it, and his brows came together hard, pulse spiking. "Lex, I...." Wanted him so much, didn't want him to see any of that, and he'd come. He'd brought Bart and Tim and probably his crazy bodyguards, and he'd come to get him.

"Bath." Clark sounded all Superman about it but Conner was probably dripping gunk on his super-secret hideout. "Now."

"Clean sounds good." Lex was still patting, petting at him, holding on for dear life, but he started to walk and Conner needed a little help with steering, a little help keeping moving or maybe it was stopping moving that would be the problem. No way to tell, and the floor was icy cold on his feet, so that probably didn't help.

"Clean sounds awesome." And food. And maybe sleep, someplace warm, curled around Lex, or better yet, Lex curled around him. He was never tired, but now he was completely exhausted, and he didn't know what to do about that.

"How do you feel?" Lex kept him moving, and they were heading through another door, funny towering arch things that made no sense in modern architecture. Hell, in human architecture. Clark didn't get too friendly about people visiting his super-secret hideout, so it must have been scary as hell serious. That made him shudder a little to realize, and it took him a minute to register the question, never mind the answer.

How did he feel? He had no idea. "Not nearly as bad as when you came to get me." Conner felt his mouth stretching into a grin and he stumbled to a stop, reaching a hand up to touch Lex's face. "You came to get me."

"Of course." Like it was easy and obvious, except nothing in life ever worked easy and simple, never ever. Never. "Tim helped. And Impulse." Who was kind of crazy, and also scary smart. Conner was pretty sure he remembered being sewed up in one hell of a hurry and he glanced down to look at himself, frowning.

Scars. He didn't usually scar at all, but they were all over him, lines and dots of raw color, and he felt the blood rush out of his head at the sight of them. "Holy fuck. I'm. 'm seriously messed up."

Clark cleared his throat. "Perhaps we should get Conner clean. And in bed."

"Hey, if this place wasn't so freakishly huge we'd be at the bathroom already." Lex snapped that, snarled, mouth curling. It made Conner's eyes go wide, his hand drop to the back of Lex's neck as if to soothe him.

"Hey. Hey. 's okay. I'm. I'm okay. You're gonna be, too. Right?" Right, and he sighed, leaned in, tugged Lex to him hard. To hell with what anybody thought about it, Clark included. "You're. You're here. So it's gonna be fine."

"She almost killed you." The scars were kind of a hint at that, and it was scary to realize that he wasn't as invincible as he thought he was. Not really, not if it had been that bad, and god. He knew he was going to be fucked up for a really long time about it, but not as bad as Lex.

"But she didn't. And now I want a bath, and something to eat, and to lie down somewhere with you so we can maybe get our acts together." His eyes were drooping already, and he wasn't sure if he'd make it through all of that at once. Eating might have to wait for sleeping, but clearly a bath wouldn't wait for anything. Not when the world felt sticky.

"It's this way." Lex pulled again, and they crossed through one more door into a room too big and a bathtub that didn't seem big enough. Somewhere along the way, Clark took off, probably for food or maybe he was just having a weird Luthor moment. Hell if Conner knew.

He eyed the tub for a long moment before he said anything. "I think I need help." It wasn't like he wanted it; he needed it, because he wasn't sure he could get in or get out or get clean or pretty much anything, and that was seriously humiliating.

"Sure. Just get in and I'll help." He was going to help Conner get in and hey at least he didn't have to undress or anything. That was a plus, right? Although the getting in felt harder than it should have.

His entire body seemed to drag, slow, and his limbs were uncoordinated. He'd never felt so bad, not fresh out of the tube, not... just not ever, and by the time he got into the tub, he was shaking from the effort, grimacing because he hurt. "Remind me not to do this again. Like. Ever."

"Get hacked up by a crazy group? Sure, absolutely." Lex pulled his own sweater up over his head, and dropped it on the floor. "Just cling in there and I'll help."

With a sigh, he dropped his head back against the wall, hands holding onto the bath a little desperately for fear he'd sink under if he let go. Sometime in between Lex getting off his sweater and the next blink, time disappeared, and he was pretty sure he'd fallen asleep. When he managed to open his eyes again, Lex was kneeling by the tub, washing Conner's chest with a cloth, slow and careful. "I love you," he blurted out, a mumbled mess of words. "I mean. I thought. When I saw you, that was all I could think was... you were there. For me. And that I do."

"I couldn't not get you back. I, if I lost you..." If he lost Conner, Conner didn't know what would happen, and Conner wouldn't be there to see.

"You won't." He wouldn't, because clearly they needed a strategy; a battle plan to make sure things like this didn't happen again, because he had a sudden sickening premonition about it, and it was better to be prepared. To be paranoid, even. "You won't."

"It's been a hell of a few weeks." Lex's mouth tipped sideways, tight, as if that was all he could say.

Letting go of the tub, Conner wrapped his fingers around Lex's bicep instead, forced himself to sit up. "Lex. Lex. I'm not. I won't leave you. I'm not... going anywhere. This. I don't want this to change things. Or... or for what I said to change anything, either. If... we don't have to be anything you don't want us to be." Because confessions of love were kind of stupid. He'd thought... but Lex hadn't said anything, so maybe not. Or maybe he was just that fucked up.

"I want to go home. I want to go home, with you, and just..."

"Hey. Hey." He held on tight, because Lex was coming unglued in front of him, and it hurt. Hurt both of them, clearly, so Conner rubbed the palm of his hand up Lex's spine reassuringly and whispered soft words, guarantees and promises and anything he could think of that might help. "Soon. Soon, just. I need to..." Finish getting clean. Pass out for a while.

Seriously talk to Lex about how there were awesome drugs in the world that might help get him through all of this crazy shit. Conner wouldn't mind a few himself. Conner was sort of hoping there were a few he could try, just to stretch his tolerance for insanity. Lex bent his head in, and seemed to pull himself together a little, patting at Conner's chest. "Sure. Let's get you out and dry."

He was close enough to clean anyway. "Yeah. Yeah, and then maybe we can sleep for a while?" He was hungry, but sleep would be better, and Lex probably hadn't done much of that, just at a guess. He looked wild-eyed and exhausted, and sleep would maybe help.

"Yeah. That sounds good. I'm sorry." Lex stood up, unsteadily, hands reaching to pull Conner up with him. "I'm sorry."

All he wanted was to say Lex shouldn't be, to say it was stupid to be sorry, but Conner was sorry, too, so it wouldn't make much difference. "Yeah. Yeah, me, too. But it's... we'll work it out. And it's not like it's your fault or mine."

"Need to make you impervious to kryptonite." Lex held onto him once he got Conner standing, even if Conner was standing up in a tub of hot something. Possibly water. Who knew, who cared, it didn't matter.

Being impervious to kryptonite sounded way awesome, but he only had the energy to grunt agreement with Lex helping him out. The floor started to do this funny thing, and he eyeballed it the whole time until it became a stand with towels. "This place is really creepy."

"I'd be less bothered by it if I'd built it myself," Lex murmured, reaching for one of the towels while he continued to hold Conner in place, keeping him from falling over or just sort of plunking himself down on the floor.

"'m not sure anything natural built this. No cracks meant against Clark, 'cause I don't think he did it, either." God, that felt good. The towel was warm and Lex was so easy, gentle. He was still sore, aching more the longer he was up, but it felt fantastic to be clean.

"Self-replicating crystals?" Lex helped, Lex helped every step, and then was there to take him to wherever the beds were, too. At least Conner's confession of love hadn't made him run away or anything. Then again, it could be guilting him into helping because it was just them, forever and ever, unless somebody managed to kill the shit out of Conner.

Clearly that was possible, and it scared him more than he wanted to consider. "Probably." One hand went down to hold the towel at his waist, Lex's arm going around him just above that. He hissed at the pressure and then shook his head. "I feel like crap."

"You're alive." Lex nudged him along, and Clark was gone, not hovering, which seemed to make Lex immediately better. Maybe he'd arrive with food and Conner could sleep-eat.

Maybe Lex could sleep-eat, too, because he looked skinnier than he had before, and that had been too damn thin then. "That part's kind of awesome. That part I like."

"Pretty fond of it, too." Lex stayed quiet until they got to the bedroom, and Conner was sort of drifty, floating, half-conscious as it was. He almost tried to lie down before they reached the actual bed, another strange platform that came out of the floor. He remembered getting in the bed, sort of, but nothing much after that.

He slept.

It was a long time, maybe, or possibly it wasn't. Exhaustion from being unwell was something with which he wasn't familiar, so it was hard to tell. What he knew was that it seemed like forever, and then he started to dream. Bad dreams, weird dreams, where the two scientists who were flaying him alive turned into people he knew, and there were steady, vicious words going back and forth between them, and then it was Lex and Clark and they were fighting with surgical instruments, and...

He woke.

"What do you have against letting someone sleep?" He could feel Lex beside him, curled around him still, but that was an edgy note to his voice.

"You've been sleeping, both of you, but you need to eat. Conner has to eat something solid so that we can be sure that everything's healed the way it should."

He didn't expect Lex to groan, quietly, and press his face against Conner's shoulder. "Fine, leave it and go."

"No." Damn. Clark just couldn't help it.

"'m awake." Kind of. Dreaming about them fighting over his worked-over body was creepy enough to be sure of it. "Bad dreams." Maybe he was kind of hungry. Starving, even, although he figured Lex wasn't. He wondered if Clark had been waking him to eat before now or if they were just always like a hissing cat bowing up at a barking dog.

"Clark has food." Lex at least was going to pretend that they weren't having a spitting fight over him. That was one way to keep up appearances. The way Clark's face was pinched, all pissy bitch, was apparently the other.

With a sigh, Conner rolled himself a little, trying to sit up. He was a lot more sore than he thought he'd been earlier. "I could eat. It's not some kind of weird alien food, is it? And if it is, can I go home to Aunt Martha?"

"It's... it's edible," Clark said after a moment. "Just try it. It tastes all right."

Not exactly a ringing endorsement, then. Clark woke him up for edible? Great. "So when can we go home again?"

He got the feeling that Clark would be grateful when they headed out of his super-secret hiding place anyway. "When you eat something and everything... Uh. Works."

"Not soon enough." Lex sat up, though, and didn't look like he was going to claw Clark's eyes out.

Works. He thought about that for a while, feeling stupid and slow, and when it finally hit him, he flushed. "Uh... yeah, okay. I can...." Hopefully eat and then do all of the necessary bodily fu nctions afterwards. Wasn't alien tech supposed to be smart enough to make things like that work?

Clark looked stupidly relieved. "Start with the blue stuff. It's... better than you'd think." He shot a disgruntled look at Lex, and Conner wondered if they'd always be bitching back and forth like that. Probably longer than he cared to think about if he was honest.

"That's still relative." Lex folded his arms over his chest, still watching Clark. Conner could see the vague twitch of a pulse in his right temple, and wow. That was impressive. Clearly Lex was going for some kind of record -- how to make Superman's head explode in sentences of three words or less.

His stomach growled embarrassingly, and then gurgled further down, and so Conner fumbled for the funny alien dinnerware with its sharp prong and promptly cursed, looking down at his fingers in horror. What the fuck. Bleeding? What the....

"Your... abilities are still recovering," Lex said after a moment. He was getting out of bed, and he was still wearing pants, reaching for a shirt to pull on. "How about a straw? Or a fork?"

"How about somebody explain this to me." Because seriously, he'd been scared before. Okay, terrified, but this was worse, sickeningly so. If he wasn't... if he couldn't... then what would happen? Was he going to age now?

Where that had seemed awesome once upon a time, back when he would have been all alone in a dying world, it didn't seem anything except horrifying now. "You need to recover. We can't tell about your powers, but the AI thinks that it's possible that your body is trying to cope with being damaged. That once you were released, it automatically began to try to repair what had happened to you." It was a shit answer, because the truth that Conner heard was that they couldn't tell. They didn't _know_ , and fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck, he was fucking bleeding, and he couldn't breathe. All he could do was stare at his fingers in horror.

"Fork," Lex reiterated at Clark, watching Conner. "You're alive, which is the important part."

Except what if he wasn't? Not like before. What if he aged, what if he got sick, what if he _died_ , holy fuck, he'd heard whispers about it, about what happened when Clark's powers left him, and....

The slap hurt like hell, left him blinking, but he could breathe again. "Oh, fuck."

"You're not allowed to panic. I don't think they've permanently damaged you, and worse case, if you got a little further along the aging spectrum you'd be even more protected," Lex pointed out, leaning in close to him now.

"But what if..."

"What ifs need to be put off, Kon-El." Oh. The Superman voice, and okay. Yeah. That was scary enough that it made him kind of get hold of himself even if what-if was looming too close on the horizon.

Okay. "Okay. I'm. Okay." He wasn't, but he would be. Lex was smart. Lex was really scary smart, and if things were seriously wrong, he'd figure out a way to make them right. He had to believe that. "Could I get not-scary utensils or something?"

"For a society that wasn't invulnerable under their red sun, they had stupid dining instruments." Lex sat beside him on the edge of the bed while Clark moved away, hopefully to get something he could actually use for eating.

"Maybe they thought it was something Clark would need here. Or maybe it's really not for eating." Maybe it was a surgical instrument, and he shuddered. Before, he'd known that Lex had been through a lot. He still knew, only now... Well. Things looked different from the inside. "I'm sorry for freaking out."

"It's your turn for it." Lex's voice tipped up a little wryly. "I... We'll make sure everything is all right.

Somehow, that made him feel better. Maybe it was stupid, but it did, and that was the important part. Sighing, Conner leaned forward, nearly unbalancing the stupid tray. Lex got the hint, and leaned in, too, letting Conner brush a kiss against his mouth, light, easy, reassuring. "Okay."

"So, I think you people need a doctor and possibly a therapist. They'll need to start with Bruce, because I think he's more screwed up than either of us." And that was a laugh, or maybe it was too grimly true.

Coming from Lex, that was a thorough endorsement for being severely messed up. "The whole Bat bunch first," Conner agreed, and smiled. "Then us. And clearly we need family therapy, 'cause. Just because." Because Lex and Clark were going to be fighting for the rest of their natural lives, he was pretty sure.

Possibly for their unnatural lives as well, given that the first Lex was dead and they were still fighting. "I think we're okay. It's... hard not to be hostile to someone threatening."

"He doesn't mean it. Or, well. He does, but I think maybe it'll take him a while to get used to the difference between then and now." Because maybe Clark would always be fighting with the Lex-who-had-been, but maybe he'd get the idea that the Lex who was now wasn't that person.

The way Lex pressed his mouth into a thin line before he leaned in to kiss Conner seemed to serve as reluctant agreement, or at least a lack of willingness to argue over it. "We'll see."

Maybe being sick had its perks. He wasn't sure he would have gotten anything like agreement otherwise. "Okay." Glancing down at the tray, he poked his finger into the blue stuff and then put it in his mouth. Hmm. Tasty. Sort of. In a weird, bland kind of way. "Not bad. You think he's hovering outside, listening for an opportunity to come in?" If Clark was, he was probably feeling kind of stupid now.

"I still think he's a douche." Just in case he was listening. Hah. "Clark?"

"Here's your fork." Sour, and yeah. He was totally eavesdropping.

Conner couldn't help but grin. Maybe he was scared and maybe he was screwed up. Maybe all of them were, but there were still reasons to be grateful, and he wasn't going to pretend there weren't. "Thanks. And we can go home soon." As soon as his bodily functions... functioned.

One should take about four hours, and the other... the other he wasn't sure about. A couple of days? Day? There had to be a way for the computer to figure that out. Lex was already halfway to stir crazy, and Conner didn't want him any further along that path.

Well. Maybe it could be sooner if he worked at it, so he started eating.

Sooner in, sooner out, and seriously, he might be ready to kill for Aunt Martha's apple pie by the time Clark let him go.

* * *

  
He couldn't sleep for shit.

That was the thing in the end. It was wearing him down at least as much as the whole powerless thing, because that was just fucking weird to the nth degree. Every now and then, he'd get a mysterious spark from the TTK, like it was almost there, and he'd completely destroy whatever he was touching. He was afraid to touch Lex, afraid to touch Aunt Martha or Uncle Jonathan, afraid to touch his goddamned shoe laces in the morning sometimes. His aunt and uncle appeared to be taking it in stride, mostly, and Lex seemed okay with it, but he had no idea if Lex actually was.

There was no way to know except to ask, and Lex was sort of lurking around all the time, like he had to be sure Conner was okay except, well, he'd always done that. They were doing okay, playing a game again. Lex had ordered two more controllers from the internet just in case Conner blew through them one more time like he had the first one already. It was quiet and companionable and not really okay because it felt kind of like playing hooky from life but maybe that was all right. He knew if he tried to get out there and save anyone, he'd turn to shit and fuck it up with his TTK like that. He'd fucked up cereal bowls, for god's sake.

He was afraid to touch Lex. He was afraid to touch himself, and seriously. He might be eighteen but his dick thought it was sixteen and he got hard in a good stiff breeze. The fact that he couldn't touch Lex made him feel weird about reciprocal issues, and yeah. He had no idea what to do or where to start. Conner knew he'd been a cranky asshat, and he knew that they all thought it had to do with what happened. It did, in that he couldn't sleep and his stress levels were peaked out because of that and the weird power spikes, but it also didn't because he just wasn't sure what to do.

Lex set the controller down after that round ended, and shifted. Just. Shifted, moved so he was thigh to thigh with Conner. "You're tense."

"Yeah." He wanted to reach out and touch Lex, get an arm around him, maybe. Just touch him, and he was afraid that if he did something bad would happen. He was practically convinced of it, and the gentle press of their legs was probably dangerous. He'd never really thought of himself as dangerous before. "Sorry. It's... I don't know." Except he kind of did because it could all end in disaster.

"You look like hell," Lex offered, not quite laughing. Peering a little, curious and interested and he probably wanted to help because he looked like hell, too, and Lex just wanted to help.

Conner let his mouth quirk upward, appreciating that fact. "Yeah, well. We both look like refugees from one of those goofy nightmare movies from last century, so." So. "I just. I want... if I could just touch something and not have it fly to fucking pieces, that would be great. I want to... but I can't." Couldn't trust himself to touch Lex or anybody, and god. Had Clark felt like this when he was younger? Or ever? He wanted to ask, but Clark had been busy lately. It was probably so he wouldn't exacerbate the situation with Lex since the two of them still went all tense and weird when they ended up in the same room.

That was going to need to come to an end eventually, but Conner didn't think he was going to be the one to do it. "I think I'm pretty safe."

"Yeah. But if something went wrong, I'd.. I don't think I could cope if I touched you and...." Things went to hell. "And I want to, I really do, but...."

"Is it possible that the spikes are related to stress?" Because if they were, they were only going to keep ratcheting up, yeah. Yeah, he could see that.

"Maybe. I have no idea. The one, the only, Experiment Thirteen." He licked his lips and glanced to the side. "It's not like anybody could know one way or another what's wrong and what isn't. I mean. There's no way to tell." Thirteen. There had been twelve of him before he'd become himself, and sometimes that haunted him a little.

Maybe one of the other ones should've been _the_ one. He'd never know. But he still wondered. "I could?"

Conner turned his head, frowned. "You think?" Having the TTK back would be kind of nice, but mostly he just wanted not to worry he was going to blow up Lex's dick in his hand.

"I... created you. A lot of the inventions I've created feel very familiar to me. I think like him, brain damage or not." Lex's mouth twitched, but it seemed all right. "Let me at least take you to the castle and see what we might be able to do."

That offer probably would have sent Clark right around the bend. He licked his lips, imagined the rooms underneath Landry Fertilizer and Mulch, and finally nodded. The idea of being studied at all scared the hell out of him but he trusted Lex not to hurt him. "Okay." No matter how afraid thinking about it made him. What if it only got worse if he didn't do anything at all?

"No labs. Just the library. I figure if you break something there, I won't give a damn." He started to stand up, but waited, watching Conner.

God. It was like Lex was reading his mind, and he felt so stupidly grateful. It was a shock when he drew in a shaky breath and had to close his eyes tightly for a minute in case... he had no idea. By the time he'd gathered himself enough to open them, Lex was offering him a hand, and he reached up to take it, letting himself be pulled to his feet.

"Even if I can't do anything, if we just knew what was going on..." Yeah. If his TTK was malfunctioning altogether or doing something else crazy

"Lex." His voice sounded rusty, and his mouth felt thick with all of the things he wanted to say. "Lex, I...."

"Hope isn't really a course of action to fix things." He pulled Conner up carefully, and probably wanted to hold onto Conner's hand but he wasn't going to do that. Conner wouldn't let him. No matter how badly it hurt to pull away, he couldn't. He just couldn't hurt Lex. Not on purpose and not on accident, because everybody else had, and he couldn't be like that.

He let out a shaky breath. "Yeah. I know. Sometimes hope's what you've got."

"I want to..." Lex closed his eyes. "I want to make it better. I don't think just waiting for you to heal is the solution."

Conner leaned in close to him, as close as he dared. "Can we talk about other stuff after we look into me?" He knew Lex would understand exactly what he meant. Waiting probably wasn't as good for him as therapy might be.

"Maybe. It depends what the topic is." He opened his eyes and turned towards the stairs, Conner following. So far he hadn't blown the floor out of the loft, but that was really a matter of time.

Lex wasn't stupid, and Conner knew that. Knew that he knew what Conner meant, and so instead of saying anything, he just followed Lex quietly and let the silence build between them. He wasn't sure, and the unease built when they got into Lex's car, kept building as they drove to the mansion. He didn't want to get out, much less go in, and it didn't matter that Lex wasn't going to experiment on him or try to stick needles in him or anything. It was just scary, thinking about what Lex might research, whether he had the notes on what those people had done to him or not, whether he'd change his mind about Conner because of anything that might be in there. He wasn't entirely human, and that could change everything.

By the time they walked silently into the library, he was close to jittering out of his skin with nerves, and it just kept ramping up and up and up until he thought he might cause things to explode feet away from him. It made him scared to stand too close to Lex, just in case.

"Why don't you sit on the sofa while I get a few things out of the vault?" Lex gestured to a wall, but Conner was already three steps ahead and guessed that a wall was only a wall when Lex Luthor wasn't involved in it.

He curled into himself on the couch and pulled his knees up loosely, wrapping an arm around them as if that might help him contain all of the stress and worry and anger, the way it felt like something was buzzing away inside of him, about to burst loose. His position allowed him to watch Lex open the wall and step into a metal on metal on metal room. It was hard to guess what was in there. He might be more curious at a later date, but not right then. Not there, not that moment. Later. For now, he was humming along, and he jerked his eyes shut tightly, breath speeding up in his chest. Fuck. Fuck, he was going to freak out before Lex even said anything, did anything, and the whole world felt like maybe it would explode if he did. He didn't even notice Lex was back until he heard him say, "Conner? It's just a camera."

A sharp burn prickled at him, at his forehead, at his eyes, and it hurt-stung-ached, made him gasp, and when he opened them, a wave of heat spread outwards. He yelled in warning, one hand flailing in front of him, because what the hell? What... just... "Lex! Lex, tell me you're okay, where are you!? LEX!" Because all he could see was _heat_ , heat and flames and burning and oh god.

"Shit!" If Lex could cuss, it was good news, Cussing Lex meant alive Lex even if he sounded pissed off, seconds before the sprinkler heads began spewing water.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit, and somehow he managed to slam his eyelids shut, still yelling, flailing to try and unfold himself from the couch, and shit. He was drenched, which meant Lex was dripping wet, too, and he didn't know what to do . "What's, I didn't... what the...."

"Let's wait for the sprinklers to turn off." Lex sat down beside him on the couch, and it sounded like he was laughing.

"Shitfuck," Conner moaned, putting a hand over his eyes. He jerked it up to his forehead a second later, just in case his eyelids went up in flames. "What the fucking fuck...."

"Puberty." Lex pressed a palm over Conner's eyelids, as if that was at all safe.

"Puberty? What the hell is that supposed to mean? I just lit your library on fire!" And things were clearly going to be going downhill from there.

"It means that Clark has heat vision, and you just _lit the library_ on fire." Lex was petting at his back, close to him, and it was absurd that they were both soaking wet and like that.

Conner gave a cracked laugh and let Lex pull him in. "Yeah, exactly, I did, but where the hell does puberty even come into that? Because I'm pretty sure I never did that, or I was aged past it. Either way, I wasn't planning on doing it anytime soon." And they were having this whole calm conversation as if he hadn't just burned part of Lex's frigging library.

"Kryptonians are slow bloomers. It's in the database. I should nickname you jailbait." He laughed, though. Lex laughed, and that was a good, good feeling. It was enough to tamp down the complete horror of that whole statement.

Slow bloomers.

He was _blooming_. Holy fucking shit. "Oh my god, I lit your library on fire."

"Yeah. So, we'll... I still need to get this to develop, I need to get the pictures to a computer. So we can see and then talk to Clark about it, because he has access to the technology but I don't think he knows how to use it."

He at least knew how to get the blue stuff, and that wasn't all that bad. "And until then, I guess I just... won't open my eyes or anything." God, what if he lit _Lex_ on fire?

"No, I think you can open your eyes. They're not glowing. They were glowing before." Lex pulled his hand back, as if he were double checking. Yeah, like Conner could trust himself just then. Like he could ever trust anybody if Lex might get hurt because he made a bad decision.

Conner took a deep breath and let it out, then slowly, deliberately, cracked open his eyes. The water turned off at the same moment, and the library door crashed back against the stone wall. Great timing. Weren't bodyguards supposed to be way faster or something?

"Another lab experiment gone wrong?" The amusement was thick in Mercy's voice. It didn't help things much; if anybody was honest about it, then the answer was yes. Conner was completely that.

The difference was that he'd been the one that Lex, the other Lex, had kept. "Conner's powers are... developing." Which was so very fucking creepy, and he was still afraid to open his eyes all the way.

Mercy stepped into sight, eyeing the damage with a smirk. "Well hopefully this doesn't happen every time he gets horny like with the other one, or we'll be losing a lot of priceless heirlooms."

"I still can't believe I was never arrested for cavorting with jailbait." Lex stroked at Conner's back. "Hey. It's okay."

"I just lit your library on fire and you told me that I'm blooming." Blooming. Oh god. Puberty. That was just wrong and fucked up and oh shit. Shit. If he was _blooming_ , then was he aging?

"I can't believe you weren't either. I'll call someone to get this fixed." Mercy put her hands on her hips. "Maybe somebody should call _him_ , too. See if he can give some good advice on how to control this."

"I think I have an idea how to fix it." Oh thank god. Thank god. "Come with me, Conner. We'll go sit outside and dry off."

Where he could only destroy the lawn furniture, or maybe the crazy garden sculptures. "Okay. Yeah." Yeah, and he breathed out, and huh. He felt, not better, but less completely stressed out in any case.

"We can fix this," Lex murmured, "if you'll let me. I think, and I'm not entirely sure, but I think that they removed something important that we can simulate or have the fortress replace. It may be an organ that your TTK is still protecting."

That made a sick kind of sense. "What makes you... I mean, why would that even make sense?" Except it did, sort of. He'd been messed up, and things had just kind of snowballed since then.

"I got into her files. There was an organ they couldn't identify." They'd clearly done something, but Lex wasn't telling him. He probably didn't want to know, and he was afraid to ask anyway. He wondered what they had done with it, and the sudden overwhelming nausea made him turn white, stumble as he tried to stand. Oh god. What was it? What if it couldn't be fixed, what if....?

"I will make you okay, Conner." Not it, but him. Make it so he was okay, and Lex was going to do that. Or try.

Try, and he didn't know how to react to that. To any of it. "Lex. What if. What if..." What if he couldn't fix him? What if he was fucked up for eternity, what if he, what if they hadn't killed him but they'd _killed him_ all the same, and Lex. Lex would be alone, and okay, he was freaking out.

"What if," Lex repeated, or agreed, halfway to frog-marching him out the door to the back yard. "I will fix you. You will be okay. Just listen to me."

"I'm listening." He was trying, at any rate, because things seemed to be happening faster than he could react to them. Puberty. Blooming. Heat vision.

 _Aging_.

The touch of Lex's fingers against his lips shocked him, and then they were in his mouth, and ugh. "That tastes awful."

"You're freaking out," Lex murmured, leaning into him, fingers trailing down shoulder. "Just. Shake it off."

Like it was that easy. He'd always been sixteen. Or almost sixteen, okay, and in the world of Kryptonians, and even half Kryptonians, that looked more like late teens to early twenties. All of a sudden, he was getting older, and maybe that meant he'd leave Lex alone one day. Maybe a lot of things, but the chemical fuzz building around him seemed to be working out pretty well. The frantic racing of his heart was slowing, and he let out a breath, deliberate and unsteady, and leaned in until his forehead touched Lex's. "Okay."

"We'll probably get this fixed in the next six months, Conner. Probably worst case. I mean, I'm unemployed, and still a genius. I can fix this. You're not going to grow a beard and turn gray and need a hip replaced."

There was no helping it. He had to laugh, a strange, giddy sound. "Oh god. That. That's... okay." Okay, because if it could be funny, then it could be okay, right? And maybe if he called Clark, he could figure out what to do about the whole blooming thing. Alien puberty. He realized he'd blurted that out and then laughed again. "Holy shit."

"Yeah. It could, I mean, look at it positively. If we let this go a little longer, you'll be... more safe." Yeah, Conner wasn't sure how that would work, given that they'd gotten Clark, too. Then again, hopefully he wouldn't be the kind of dumbass who went in to rescue somebody all by himself. There was a reason he had teammates, friends. Thank God none of them felt the urge to have pissing matches over territory, at least with one another. He was pretty sure Tim's crazy Bat bunch probably used those like some kind of bizarre family therapy.

Considering therapy.... "At least nobody will think you're robbing some kind of alien cradle?" It was the best he could do for a joke, and hmm. The drugs didn't work out that well normally, so maybe the whole TTK being missing thing had its upside. Like drugs making the world sort of fuzzy-awesome.

"Yes, so sit." On the stone steps, overlooking a garden that was overgrown and neglected enough that Aunt Martha would've cringed to see it. "We can't both have breakdowns at the same time. We'll have to schedule around each other."

It was only half possible that it was a joke. "How about we take alternating Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and leave the weekends for the good days?" The granite was cold beneath his ass, but he could still manage to smile up at Lex. For the moment, he felt a lot less like something was building, about to explode in him. Huh.

After a moment, Lex sat down beside him. "Yeah, I can do that. So, Clark was sunlight driven. We should probably keep tanning in your regime."

He couldn't help grinning then. Funny, that lighting the library on fire had made him feel better. Well, that or the drugs. "And invest in sun block for you, huh?" Conner let out a heavy sigh. "I, uh. Feel better now. Actually."

"I feel better, too." He leaned into Conner, and that felt good. Sunlight and Lex.

Maybe he was getting older. Maybe he'd age, and develop weird eyegasms like Clark, or get a little broader through the shoulders. Maybe. He had faith in Lex, though, and so he was just going to have to trust that things would work out, that they'd be okay, and that Lex would be able to fix it. He'd be able to make it right. "I'm glad." Glad, and maybe not so scared to reach out and slip an arm around him, not afraid he'd hurt Lex just by touching him.

He was pretty sure it wasn't going to stay that easy, but he was safe and Lex wasn't going to run off just because his body was falling apart. That was something to be grateful for, he guessed, and closed his eyes there in the sunlight, soaking it in and finding it easy to hope for the best in his current drugged state.

* * *

  
Conner wasn't an experiment to him, and that was making it hard.

That was the odd problem of it. He wanted to linger over Conner, he wanted to read with him, play games with him, laze and explore their small world together. He didn't really want to consider him as a test subject, and so it wasn't possible to review their notes and research with anything like a jaded eye. Too often he'd find himself stopping to lean back because the last two paragraphs had made him so sick he wanted to vomit, and it was better if he didn't do that in his keyboard.

In the end, he'd had no choice but to make the call. There was only one person he could think of who might be able to maintain the necessary distance to study what had gone on without being too close to things. The fact that he was probably mad as a hatter, well.

Clearly it wouldn't be the first time Lex had dealt with a madman.

Getting him to answer and respond appropriately was entirely another question, but he was going to have to trust the man. He dialed Wayne Manor, and wondered if they had a robot there to handle the business of the house.

 _~"Wayne residence."~_ It wasn't Alfred, but Alfred had been ancient when they were kids. Lex decided that it was better for his sanity if he considered Alfred as happily retired and living in one of the large rooms on the lower floor than anything else.

"I need to speak to Bruce Wayne. I know you're about to tell me he's not available, but regardless of how hard he is to reach, he's always available. I'm a Luthor calling for help." He had to hope that would be enough, because if he had to beg, then he was going to call Tim next, and Tim would probably be glad to help him force Bruce to do what he needed him to do.

The pause on the other end of the line lingered until it was uncomfortable, and Lex was seconds from snapping angrily when the answer came. _~"One moment, sir."~_

"Thank you." It was probably a robot. It was probably Alfred's consciousness downloaded into a tin shell, and god, he could say that, couldn't he? Because he could clone his own people, had cloned them. Had cloned himself, and did that make him as much of a seriously sick fuck as the bastards who'd written up these notes? Maybe, but he had to have help, and it had to be Bruce. Clark would know things about Kryptonian biology but he didn't have the kind of critical mind that Excelsior had fostered in its students. He wouldn't be able to see the things that Lex should be able to see but couldn't quite face.

A click sounded, infinitely loud in his ear. _~"Lex. What do you want?"~_

"Conner didn't come together... completely correct. I need another set of eyes to look over the original notes and my thoughts to date." He didn't need to explain, hopefully, that he was having problems with viewing a friend and companion as a subject.

 _~"And you thought I'd be the perfect candidate for the job."~_ The skepticism was felt through the line.

Yes. Yes, he thought Bruce was the person who'd best be able to maintain a fitting distance. He couldn't, and Clark would never manage it. While Mercy and Hope had begun the appropriate medical studies, he wanted to keep any information about Conner very close to his breast for now. He wouldn't be showing Bruce if he wasn't desperate.

"Yes. You were brilliant, once, and I don't think you've flushed that all away since I knew you." He hunched in at the phone a little, waiting for Bruce to give him an answer. "He's one of your own."

More than that, he was Lex's, and while they had time -- aging a year or two wouldn't hurt Conner -- they didn't have as much as he had originally suspected. Conner was aging more quickly than he should have, as if time was in double-forward. Six months would mean a year, a year would mean two, and he wanted this solved before the aging became an issue.

He'd promised.

The steady release of breath on the other end of the line was almost silent. _~"Are you sending me the information or do you expect me to come to you?~_

He was keeping tabs on it, but there was only so much he could do. "If you could come here, this would be easier. We don't really have a lot of time to correspond about it." Plus he didn't want the information out of his hands. It was dangerous for Conner and for Clark, and he'd spent most of his life guarding his knowledge of Krypton jealously.

_~"Fine. I'll be there tonight."~_

The flood of relief that filled Lex was no reason to be ashamed. He'd hoped Bruce would come, but hope and reality often had nothing to do with one another in his experience. He was just glad that he had agreed. "Up at the castle. We'll see you then." He didn't need to get Conner involved, not the first night, but he was going to tell him what was going on. Keeping secrets had been what had spiraled him and Clark into such shit in the first place. Secrets and lies and obsessions, and they still had those lies between them even now. It didn't matter that Lex wasn't that person anymore. It was always going to be there, thick and cloying and unspoken.

The phone clicked in his ear, Bruce hanging up on him. It would be funny, the idea that there were still old-fashioned phones in this world, far older than the one he remembered, except that it seemed perfectly in keeping with Gotham somehow.

He set the phone aside, closed his eyes, and exhaled. Get Conner, tell Conner, warn Mercy and Hope that visitors were coming. Lex was fairly sure he hadn't always had to keep things quite so structured, so rigid, so freshly stated, but he was also fairly sure that still he wasn't functioning at full capacity. The fact that he was aware of it should be enough to let him control it, but sometimes it spiraled away from him, especially on days when it was clear Conner was coming into some other insane Kryptonian mutation. The heat vision had been entertaining because he'd realized what was happening. There had been a certain amount of delight in that from the relief of knowing what was happening.

The x-ray vision hadn't been nearly as much fun, mostly because it had given Conner a screaming migraine for three straight days. He'd spent the first one puking and begging Lex to kill him if it got any worse. By the third, he'd been able to call himself a crybaby, but it had been with a look that made Lex want to go out and slay whatever idiot thought sending a child from Krypton to Earth was a good idea. Never mind the fact that he'd ultimately been at the root of Kon's creation.

It was better, easier, to do it face to face. He didn't want to do it with a phone call even though they were easy to make. There was too much opportunity for misunderstandings. He made a quick side trip to the study to forewarn Hope and Mercy. Mercy lifted a hand, waved him off, and he headed outside to climb in the Porsche.

Getting back to the farm was easy now, second nature. Lex had been spending his days at the castle, trying to work out what was going on and how to fix it. The acceptance that he just couldn't handle all of the research had been difficult, even to admit to himself, and Conner had been sick some of the time. Weird Kryptonian shit, and Clark came down some days to try and help him cope with it.

It was maddening, but good to see Conner, good to settle in and be home and know they were close to a solution because if he was going to be eternal he didn't want to deny Conner that if he wanted it. If, and that was a moral issue all on its own, but without it, he suspected Conner was time-set to expire in probably five to ten years. Lex wasn't sure he could be Lex without Conner. He didn't know if he could keep going like that, if he could stop himself from turning into the man he'd been before, and that terrified him.

"Hey. You gonna sit there all afternoon?"

It surprised him, made him look up, and huh. He'd made it back to the farm, safely parked in the yard, Conner grinning down at him. It was a pretty good day, even if he looked sweaty and dusty from helping out Jonathan for the afternoon.

"I was coming home to say hi. Bruce is going to swing by to look at the research." The research, which was nice and sterile and not at all Conner. He turned the engine off, and popped the door.

Conner moved in, all easy grace. He'd been tall before, but in the last week he'd shot up another inch or two, making them pretty much eye-to-eye. "That's... that's good. I mean, he already kind of creeps me out, so what's one more thing to make me twitchy?" One hand reached out, lightly touched Lex's hip, and Conner dropped his lashes, peeking up at him from underneath the dark fringe of them. "Hi."

It was an invitation to kiss him, and Lex wasn't one to turn down such a prettily proffered opportunity.

He leaned in, kissed Conner, enjoyed the feeling of him which was still odd because Clark made his hackles rise, but Conner was an immediate trust field. "We'll help you."

"Mmmmm." That hum was hot, made him want to lick into Conner's mouth and kiss him the way he wanted. Instead, he pulled back slowly, opening his eyes to observe the faint flush of Conner's cheeks, the way he looked entirely pleased to see Lex there. "I know. I've got faith in you."

"Good. Someone has to. Do you want to be there, or would you rather... not?" It was up to him, and he had no idea what future relations he'd had with Wayne. He remembered their past well enough. He wondered if Conner was the jealous type. He had never seemed like it, but then, Lex usually looked tired and too skinny, and nobody in Smallville seemed to like him much even when he went around being Alex Kent.

Conner was watching him as if he could read his mind. God, he hoped that wasn't some new Kryptonian power like the others. "I know what you're thinking."

Mind reading was generally an uncomfortable concept. "Do you? You probably do."

"Well, it's written all over your face for anybody who bothers to read it." The hand that slid over his hip was sun-warm, gentle. "Or maybe that's just me. You know, you're not that guy. Okay, you've got the memories, but he's not the guy you remember anymore either. He's the creepy Bat, so I don't exactly feel overly threatened."

He laughed, just a little, still watching Conner's face. "Okay. I'll keep that in mind. The fetish suit wasn't quite the Bruce I remember." At least Tim's costume had a little color in it, and a lot less pre-sculpted muscles. Also, Bruce as Batman kind of fucked him up in a scared, twitchy sort of way.

"One more kiss?" The curl of his mouth was wonderful. Knowing that Conner was having a good day was enough to make Lex's better. They'd been few and far between lately.

"Yes, and then I should get back. I just wanted to... see you." Assure himself he was all right, and then get back to the grindstone of trying to solve him.

He did take breaks, occasionally. To sleep. To eat. To kiss Conner in the driveway, in the sunlight. It was better than all of the half-remembered fantasies about kissing Clark, or at least he thought it was.

"Mmmm. Mmmhm." Their mouths parted, but Conner stayed close. "You gonna be late again? I could come up. Bring pizza. Irritate your girlfriends."

"Bring pizza, irritate my girlfriends. We'll eat it and come back home." The time it took to eat dinner was all the time he reasonably needed to wrap up work, and he wasn't going to waste all of his opportunities to be with Conner. Maybe that was the difference between the old him and who he was now.

He loved that bright grin. "Sure. Hey, I'm gonna go help Uncle Jon with the tractor. I'll see you tonight?" It was like making a date, as if they didn't sleep curled one around the other on an old sofa bed every night.

One of these days, Lex was going to buy a bed for the loft.

Just make it official. Or get a better sofa bed to turn into the old sofa bed. Lex leaned in one more time, and kissed Conner, just because he could. Just because it tasted good and felt warm. "Tonight. Thanks."

God, he loved this. "No need to thank me. Unless you wanna go up to the loft for a while. Then, you can thank me afterwards." Flirting was so good. "Go, go on, I know you've got work to do, and the creepy Bat moves fast. Plus..." Conner poked a thumb back towards the barn. "Uncle Jon."

Uncle Jon, who was ultimately very tolerant of their making out in the driveway. He probably would have castrated the old Lex. "Right. I'll see you tonight with pizza." Lex pulled away reluctantly, headed back to his car. It was good to have something grounding. Conner made him feel real. Made him feel human, and that was good.

"Tonight." One last peck on the lips and Conner turned around and strolled back into the barn, hands in his back pockets.

* * *

  
He'd been at it for another two hours before he heard the sound, a creak from high in his ceiling. "Hello, Bruce."

That flair for dramatics had always been there, hiding beneath the dour expression he'd normally worn. It wasn't any surprise that he lurked in shadows, on rooftops, hiding somewhere in the darkness of his library. "Lex."

"Would you like to sit down? Tea, or coffee?" He wasn't going to be shaken, flustered, or rattled. He refused. It was his castle, and Bruce was his invited guest, even if he was a strange one.

Leather creaked.

"I'd like to review the data."

"Then get off my ceiling and sit down." Lex folded his arms over his chest, staring up at Bruce while he walked over to his computer. It was the only place the data was available. It was off-network, stripped down to almost nothing, and the security that Mercy had put on it was probably something she'd picked up while Other him had been president. Frankly, it was probably more intimidating than Bruce, even when he came up behind Lex in a faint rustle of air and rubber and leather.

"How far in have you gotten?"

"He's missing a regulatory organ. I have no idea what it was, what it looked like, or what exact mechanisms it functioned through." Lex gestured to the screen, and stepped back. "And he's going to age at an accelerated rate. I've been tracking it, and he's pegged at a two-to-one ratio right now. Right now."

The shadows seemed to follow Bruce when he was dressed that way. It made Lex wonder if he had his own personal holographic generator or some other nifty toy to do that for him. "Some of the other clones have shown more greatly accelerated aging, and often become corrupted." As if they were data, and he supposed they might be, in a way. "Or die of clone disease. It's the effects of the kryptonite within the process. I'm assuming there are photographs."

"Yes, of course. I don't think I appropriately identified the organ at the time. It's..." It's Conner, was the problem. Some of them had Conner's face, and just looking at them, any of them, made him sick. That was the main problem -- he couldn't look at them and see what he needed to see.

Somewhere in hell, his father was undoubtedly shaking his head and declaring him to be a failure of a Luthor. Maybe he was, but Lex thought that there wasn't any weakness in being unable to view photographic evidence of someone he loved as they were being tortured.

"Lex." He hated that mask. It was impersonal and just plain strange. "There is... nothing wrong in needing help with this investigation. Under the circumstances, I find it." That strangely deep, gravelly voice paused. "Encouraging."

Encouraging. Lex closed his eyes for a moment, not looking at Bruce. "Conner matters to me. I want him to be all right. It makes it harder to do this, and that's..." Ironic, paradoxical.

"Encouraging," Bruce said again, and that flat masked gaze turned away, moved so that he was looking at the screen again. It was dismissive, and Lex was inclined to allow it to be.

He stepped back, let Bruce look, tried not to stress too hard at what Bruce might or might not have been thinking. It was easier to watch that blank masked gaze flip through screen after screen, calling up the appropriate photographs with each section of research. He never flinched or pulled away from the information, so Lex knew that he had made the right call. It was disturbing to him that Bruce seemed to find it that easy, that simple to ignore the fact that it was someone he knew, and it made him wonder if the Other him had been like that, or possibly worse. The same sort of cold obsessiveness, and he never wanted to reach that stage, he never wanted to hit the point where it was acceptable to him to be that kind of detached, pulled away. There had to be a way to be a scientist and still give a damn. He'd figured out how to help augment Hope and Mercy without...

"Here." Like that one word was an explanation, like Lex would want to look. Clearly he had less than no interest in doing that, but it wasn't as if he had much of a choice.

He still looked, the careful-- oh, oh, that wasn't Conner's splayed open body. That was him. Him and the same damn organ. "I, that's it."

"It's not human, and it's not Kryptonian." That blank gaze was looking back at him again, and Lex felt his skin crawl. "It's definitely some sort of regulatory organ, the way you thought, only it's directly related to being a clone. Do you still have the notes for all of your cloning procedures?" As if Bruce didn't have them somewhere, too. The same thought clearly flickered behind the mask even if Lex couldn't see it because he spoke again. "The ones I have are missing some of the more important esoteric parts."

"Of course. I'll go retrieve them." And not stare too hard at the alien-autopsy style photo of himself from those films. He remembered all of it, had been awake for most every moment of it. And never wanted to think about it again. It was one of the reasons he didn't poke Conner, didn't ask if he wanted to talk about things. He knew that wasn't something anyone needed to discuss. Either of them.

Never mind the way Conner eyeballed him, suggesting therapy without saying the words.

Entering the weapons vault with Bruce looking over his shoulder made Lex clench his teeth. He didn't need to expend the funds to replace it, never mind the fact that the investments he'd been making had started to pay off. There was a ridiculous amount of damage at his Landry plant, most of it brought on by the Justice League and the Justice juniors, and all of that needed fixing. Maybe he should just send Bruce the bill.

He just didn't want to fritter away the resources like that, in case there was an emergency. So, the vault would stay where it was, and he went in to retrieve the data card.

Bruce seemed to know what he was looking for, so it didn't take long once the card was safely lodged in the reader. "Here. Experiment Twelve, four years ago. See the mutation, the way this organ developed secondary to the lymphatic system, specifically the spleen. There were heavily altered monocytes, so Experiment Twelve lasted longer than the previous attempts at combining Kryptonian and human DNA. They were still using regular human DNA at that point. When they began Experiment Thirteen, they used your kryptonite-altered DNA and made sure to transplant part of the mutated organ directly into Conner." They meaning him, Lex knew. He'd read those reports as well. "We need to have him scanned. If it's missing, and the notes here imply that it is...."

"I've had him scanned. He's missing it. The problem is that it isn't growing back." And Lex's had grown back. His health was good, he was still self-healing. He wasn't aging, and he'd checked the cell-growth.

"Then you know what you need to do to fix this."

As if it was just that easy. As if he knew who to trust, or how to make it work, and what if it wasn't the same? What if their tissues didn't match or... But that was a stupid idea, he realized, blinking. Of course their tissues would match. The question still rested on anti-rejection drugs and other things but he knew how to make the arrangements.

"Someone will have to perform it. I'll be... unavailable." If it was just that simple, if it went just that well. At least there was the comforting notion that they'd be allowed anesthesia this time. Both of them.

"Rumor has it you've wet-wired your two.... bodyguards." Whatever other word he'd considered was precisely avoided, unspoken but not unsaid. "And that you have plans to make them medically competent."

"They're plans in progress," Lex murmured. "It should be done soon."

"How soon?" It made Lex twitch, made him want to know what Bruce knew that he didn't.

"Tomorrow." He cocked an eyebrow at him. "Why?"

The sharp set of shoulders beneath cape and shadows seemed to relax. "Three days after the complete removal of that organ from Experiment Twelve, the clone died of rapid aging."

Lex clenched his teeth a little. "I wonder why mine grew back and not his. We'll finish it tonight, then. They'll be ready tomorrow." Suddenly, the urge to let Conner develop, gain new skills, new ways of protecting himself, made him as sick as looking at the photographs had done.

Batman stood, and the shadows swirled around him with the flutter of that cape. "I'll be here."

"All right. I have work to do, then." And he should be done by the time Conner joined him with pizza. Maybe that would give him enough time to think of what to tell him, how to explain it, and Lex ignored the squeak of rubber-leather-movement, the disappearance of the shadows that had seemed to creepy over his library for the last few hours.

* * *

  
It was probably for the best that he didn't have much time to spend with Conner before the prescheduled 'surgery'. Just the thought of it left him twitching, nervous beyond belief, and the way Conner's eyes had darted to all corners of the room seeking escape when he'd told him what they had to do was going to haunt him for weeks.

Maybe forever.

But it was better to have Conner alive and hurting than dead of old age. There was letting Conner age a little and then there was Conner aging... far too much. While she was in there, he was going to make sure Mercy took a culture of the cells, so he had something to work with if they ever found themselves in a similar situation.

In the meantime, he was mostly going to try and organize the extra surgical equipment that had started arriving mid-afternoon so that the operating suite that occupied part of the old wine cellar would be ready by the time everything else was in place. Tim and Bart had arrived with it and were currently sterilizing the entire room with a single-minded purpose that defied the imagination of the average intellect. Now it was just a waiting game. He wasn't sure if he would've felt better or worse if Mercy had shown the slightest bit of nerves.

"Luthor."

Of course. As if the day wasn't bad enough, there was Clark in all of his primary-colored spandex glory, glaring at him as if he'd done something so infinitely evil and wrong that the only recourse was to do the things he'd read about happening in his database -- concussions, broken bones, injuries that would have killed someone who hadn't already been mutated by kryptonite.

It was no wonder he had quite so much protective gear in his weapons room. "Superman. What brings you here?"

"What do you think?" God. Clark could be such a supercilious ass. So self-righteous, as if he was the only person on the Earth who could possibly know right from wrong, be able to help anyone. He wondered if that had finally been what drove him over the edge to super-villainy. "Surgical items have been flooding into Smallville, Luthor, and not to the hospital. Here."

"You're an asshole." Lex folded his arms over his chest. "You just jump to a conclusion and run with it. I'm working with Bruce to fix Conner. The Junior Justice Leaguers are here to help."

The slow blink that made blue twitch towards green made him wonder if Clark had ever been inclined to believe Other him or if this was something new. "Bruce. And Tim and....?"

"Flash. Bart. Conner will be here soon to scrub up, and then I will." Lex kept his arms folded over his chest. "If nerves don't get him." In which case, he'd die, and then Lex would be forced to have Mercy take out every last trace of the extra organ and hope that it worked as well for him as Experiment Twelve.

"Tell me. All of it." Still arrogant, sharp, and the illusion that made him look more alien than Clark was wavering still.

"He's missing a regulatory organ specific to our model of clone. We're going to implant half of mine in the hopes that it's going to go like a liver, and grow back in." Fingers crossed. How insane was that?

Crazy enough that Clark's eyes went wide and green and maybe even a little scared, like he believed what Lex was telling him. Maybe he did. "Do you... I mean...."

"What? Do I what?" There was no telling, though there was a lot of guessing, everything from _'does that mean you'll donate'_ to _'do I think you're an ass?'_

"You're going to give him half of this regulatory organ. After...." One big hand clenched into a fist. "I've seen the photos."

"There's a lot of photos around. I'm not sure what you're referring to." Or why he was angry.

Swirl of color, air, and there was Clark, looking like he should, and not like the arrogant son of a bitch who'd appeared in his library out of thin air. "All of them." All? His and Conner's and... All of them?

"I don't know what that has to do with it." He kept his arms crossed, because he didn't welcome Clark any more than he welcomed Superman.

"It has everything to do with it, Lex!" Arm flung outwards, scowl on his face as if Clark was thirteen again. "It has to do with, with you, and with what happened to you, what happened to Conner. It has to do with..." He seemed to pull himself back together. "You. You aren't Luthor anymore. You are but..." Clark's jaw clamped. "Conner makes you better."

"Maybe. Or maybe he's not working against me." He was pretty sure he hadn't been about to revert into a crazed lunatic before Conner. But without him, life looked miserable, unbearable.

Maybe it had looked that way without Clark, too. He didn't know, and he didn't want to know. "You're going to willingly allow somebody...."

"Mercy."

That twitch spoke volumes. "Mercy?"

"Mercy. I programmed her myself, so if it goes wrong, I know who to blame." He stretched out a hand, then refolded his arms. "I can't let Conner die."

He would die. Lex had been looking at their cells, his own and Conner's. The mutated monocytes in Conner were half of what Lex's were, and they were probably dropping every day. The only reason he hadn't died as soon as Experiment Twelve was that he'd had four years of that extra organ pumping them out and keeping him stable.

The touch of Clark's hand on his shoulder made him jump. "I understand what it's going to cost you."

Stepping back and away from Clark was easy, a smoothly executed motion. "Surprisingly, less than you think. It's not really a choice. Sure, I could say no, but Conner would die and that's, wanting him around isn't exactly altruistic of me."

Silence stretched out for long minutes and he thought Clark would say something, would either snipe at him or say something ridiculously sentimental. He didn't know which. It was a surprise when he finally spoke, almost as if it was painful to do so. "Thank you."

What did he say to that? _'You're welcome'_ seemed inappropriate. "I'm going to see if they're ready yet. You can stay and not end up hogtied by Hope, if you want."

Those impossibly broad shoulders shrugged. "Do you mind if I see what they're setting up?" It seemed like an honest question but it probably meant the investigative reporter in him wanted proof of some kind.

"Of course. Go for it." He gestured, hanging back, wanting to stay away from Clark. Just because he could, he supposed.

He was surprised when Clark stopped at the door and looked back. "I meant it when I said thank you."

"I still don't know what to do with that." Maybe the other one would've cared more. Reacted the way Clark wanted him to react, but Lex couldn't bring himself to do it, so he turned away.

He had too many other things to worry about between now and tomorrow.

* * *

  
It was ridiculous to be at the castle at six in the morning. Conner was familiar with surgical procedures -- they'd always wanted Uncle Jonathan at the hospital at some ungodly hour for tests and preparation for these things. There was just him and Lex and a bunch of scary people who were way more familiar in costume, though. Getting there at six seemed obsessive, right up until Bruce Wayne started swabbing him with alcohol and setting up IV drips.

"You realize this is even creepier than anything else, ever," he complained to Tim a few minutes later.

"No way. We've done creepier," Tim offered. "I mean. Space aliens on a regular basis. That's creepier. The chick who kidnapped you? Creepier."

Conner scowled. "There is nothing creepier than the Bat hovering over me with a needle when there's just a cotton hospital gown between me and naked."

"Well." Bart was eating a bowl of ice cream, like it was anything remotely like real breakfast. "You could have been entirely naked while he hovered over you with a needle."

Yeah. That would be creepier. "Thanks."

"You're welcome."

"Hey, you ready?" Lex looked tired and worn thin, which was almost a normal state for him. Conner was starting to wonder what healthy, stable Lex looked like. Just a little. He had high hopes he'd get to see that one day.

Instead of saying as much, he scowled and looked him up and down. "Well, I guess at least one of us should get to roam free, escaping the creepy maskless Bat and his needles." He didn't mean it quite the way it sounded, especially when what he wanted was for Tim and Bart to take a hike and Lex to crawl up into the bed with him.

"Yeah, there's a couple of things we need to go over first. I thought I'd stick my head in and say hi before we got started." And the way Conner wanted to say hi was all against sterile.

He tried to muster up a smile anyway. Tim was watching him steadily and Bart was eyeing Lex. "Okay." Okay, and he tried hard to ignore the vague sound of Bart's spoon rattling in the bowl. God, he hoped anesthesia was as awesome as rumored.

Tim cleared his throat. "Hey, Bart, let's, uh..."

"Oh, yeah, sure. We'll be back in a few minutes." Bart lifted his eyebrows and then wagged them at Lex. Conner couldn't decide if that was flirting or not, and his narrowed gaze just barely escaped providing heat vision encouragement as they slipped out of the room, shutting the door behind them.

"Hey." Like he'd just stepped into the room. Sometimes, Conner thought he was a total dork. The rest of the time? He knew he was. "Come here?"

"You'll be okay." Lex said it before he even got over to Conner, sliding an arm around his shoulder. "Also, you reek of rubbing alcohol."

"Yeah, well. I'm sure you'll get your turn." He turned his head, brushed his cheek against Lex's slowly. It was soft where his own was a little rougher, more bristled. "I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one worried about what comes next." Lex ought to be freaking out even worse, according to Tim.

Lex seemed calm. Lex seemed placid, almost, leaning into Conner. "No, but nothing can be accomplished with worrying."

Maybe not, but he was starting to get kind of suspicious that a lot could be accomplished with good drugs. He didn't say anything like that, just reached up and caught Lex's right hand with his own and sat there with him for a long moment, because it was okay. Everything would be fine because Lex willed it so, and the idea of that made his mouth quirk.

"Hey." Like he hadn't said it three minutes ago or anything. Lex turned his head and they were nose to nose then so that Conner could lean in and kiss him, tender and soft. "If this doesn't work, don't... don't feel all weird or guilty. Because however long it lasts, I'm okay with that. Whatever time I have with you, I... I want to have it. More than anything."

It made him a little sick that Lex was going to do this for him. Sick and guilty and worried, and he was pretty certain that made him a selfish ass because he still wasn't turning it down. "It should last forever, though. It was originally done as a graft, and it worked, and mine grows back." Lex shifted to half-hugging, and there was the faint fast fast fast verbalized thought-thread that told Conner that Lex was only tamped down by good drugs.

He let Lex curl in, carefully brought his arm with the attached line around to pull him closer. "Stay with me until it's time. Nobody's going to mind." If it made Conner feel better, it might help Lex, too. If they could just stay there, close and quiet, maybe they could even pretend this wasn't happening for a few minutes. It couldn't be much longer anyway.

"Bruce might." Bruce could damn well mind, because Lex was only slowly relaxing into him. "Mmph. The waiting is killing me."

The waiting was rough. "It's gonna be all right. You taught them..." Whatever they needed to know. Bruce would be eyeballing the whole thing, like he knew anything about surgery. "It's gonna be fine. And when it's all over, we'll...." Do something. Go somewhere. He'd somehow managed to graduate in all of the chaos, even passed calculus. It wasn't like he had any kind of obligations beyond doing whatever Lex wanted to do.

"Run away to the city?" Lex laughed, faint, muffled against Conner's shoulder. "I like it out here. Metropolis, you were always wondering who was going to shoot at you from a window, who was going to shoot at you socially."

That said far too much about Lex's life. This Lex, the other Lex. Just thinking about it made him sad. "Well, I was thinking more like take a vacation. Spend a lot of time together and maybe do that whole thing with the candlelight and nice sheets we talked about." It had been a while, but then, things had been kind of messed up.

He'd been scared, and then Lex had been busy trying to save his life. Scared sex wasn't really good sex as far as Conner was concerned. "Yeah. Once we're sure you're going to be okay." In case they had to go for a round two, maybe, and that was a horrifying thought.

The door opened, and Hope walked in, eyeing them both. "You escaped."

Well crap. "It's my fault," Conner offered, because there was Bruce, right behind her, and Clark, too. Great.

He felt Lex exhale against his skin, starting to sit upright. "I just needed a moment to think before we did this."

Stepping in, she closed the door in those other two faces. Maybe he ought to propose. "Minute's up, boss. It's time to get your IV in and get you moving."

Conner licked his lips. "Can we go in together? I mean, before....?" Before whatever.

"Maybe." Maybe was good enough, because Hope was flexible and not staring at him with hate in her eyes. That was good enough.

"Okay. IV and gown. Let's get this started."

 _Sooner started, sooner finished._ Conner could hear Uncle Jonathan say it in his head, but he leaned in and kissed Lex anyway. "I'll see you in a minute."

In a minute. And then they'd get it over and done with, and either it would work or it wouldn't, but they'd at least know. That was something.

Conner would take what he could get.

* * *

  
Hospital smells and his own shitty crazy taste in basement decor never needed to meet. Ever. It was cold stone and purple recessed track lighting, which made him think of captivity and too much pain for any one person.

Mostly he just felt sore and groggy and confused.

"Hi, there." That was... Mercy, right, leaning over him, and doing something, and then he closed his eyes and when he opened them again, it was to the stone and track lighting again. Hm.

Time moved that way, in jumps and starts, and he thought he heard talking in there, Conner saying something that was clearly very funny. When he opened his eyes again, he couldn't remember what it was, but he was a little more awake that time, and Mercy was back. She poked at him, used a pen light to annoy him, and then covered him up with a warm blanket and said something that he mostly missed because he was looking around, trying to find Conner.

Talking didn't work right off, which was stupid, but he wasn't used to having to throw off an anesthetic as well as everything else that went with healing. His first shot at talking was a failure, a mumble of mush that made him give up and just keep looking.

Every now and then, he'd realize that he'd drifted off, and sometimes he'd dream about Conner talking. The next time he remembered waking up, it was true. Conner was babbling, and apparently he knew a rather appalling number of dirty limericks.

"Awake this time?" That was Hope, and she was smiling. "He talks every time he comes around. Sometimes he asks about you. Sometimes he does this. How are you feeling?"

"Sick? Drifty." Sore and confused, but he was happy to hear Conner, though. Hearing Conner was important.

"Mmm, yeah. Well, considering we're all rank amateurs, you both came through pretty well. You lost a fair amount of blood, but the healing kicked in before we even thought about closing you up." He closed his eyes, and it was a little surprising to open them and find her still there. "And the organ attached almost on its own. I think we've got a pretty good prognosis. Here, let me...." Needle sting. Funny that something so small would make him so unhappy. "For the nausea."

"There was a sweet girl of Decatur...."

"Not many things that Decatur rhymes with," Lex offered, letting his head loll on the pillow behind him. "Hi, Conner."

Conner turned his head slowly, and when he saw Lex, he grinned so hard that it was a little surreal. "Sure there is. It's Asimov. There was a sweet girl of Decatur, who went out to sea on a freighter. She was screwed by the master, an utter disaster, but the crew all made up for it later."

Lex wasn't sure whether to laugh or stare at Conner. "He processes drugs sideways, huh?" Not quite right, but god, he was talking and that was good. He was alive and maybe Lex could relax a little. Take a deep breath and rest, and that would be the best thing that had ever happened to him.

The hand on his arm was warm, and so was Hope's laughter. "Are you kidding? Big Blue blushed up to his ears the third limerick in and took off."

"I know more," Conner offered, but he was watching Lex now, all sleepy eyes and crazy high smile. "You want me to tell you more, Lex?"

"I think I'm okay on limericks. You look good." And his body was processing it, maybe. Soon they'd be able to do a blood draw and they'd know for sure that it was working.

Just watching, seeing Conner move, made him stupidly happy. "I feel awesome. I feel pretty and witty and...."

"And we know the rest." That was Mercy, coming in from the doorway. "Vitals seem to be good. You're both ahead of the curve, aside from him being high as a kite. How are you?"

"Okay. Coherent." Ish. As long as his eyes stayed open, though he was afraid that when he closed them again he'd lose a lot of time.

"I gave him something for the nausea. He'll probably be out again soon."

Mercy nodded. She was poking around under his sheets and blankets, changing bandages, and he winced. "He should be good to go within the next six hours or so."

"Good to go where?" Conner hadn't taken him over, but they possibly shared enough time together that he asked it before Conner did.

Conner waved a hand. "Not away, right?" Worry wasn't as much fun as dirty limericks.

"Good to go as in healed enough that we can probably stick you upstairs and let you roll around in that giant bed that takes up way too much of your bedroom." Tape rolled over his skin, and Lex yawned.

"Mmm, I like that bed. Soft sheets, firm mattress, but not hard." Comfortable, luxurious, decadent. He almost wanted to ask if Conner could come, but Mercy had moved on to poking underneath his sheets now, and that. That was a very scary frown. He didn't like that frown, not at all. "What...?"

"Hope. Come look at this."

"What is it?" He sat up too fast, and grimaced at how that felt, but he had to know. Mercy shouldn't have been frowning at him.

"Lie back down." It was an order, and he didn't want to follow it, but he knew that tenderness. Knew that he was going to need to obey, at least for now.

Hope was frowning, too. "It's... This is interesting. And unexpected. Clearly we should have done some more research."

One hand flailed over the side of Conner's bed, towards Lex. "I liked it better when there were dirty limericks in my head."

"We're both here and awake. Talking around us isn't going to help," Lex gritted out.

Mercy snorted. "Well, until I get some kind of imaging equipment in here, I can't be completely sure of what's going on, but I'd say we've got a raging success on our hands.â€

"It's good news?" He sounded. A little startled, felt a little startled because that wasn't the outcome he was expecting. He was expecting the worst, for it to all go wrong.

"I'd say it's very good news, but now that we can understand a little more of the medical science behind what's been done, I think we need to reread all of the cloning reports." The bandages were going on Conner, and he seemed a little pale, but Lex probably did, too. "We're going to give both of you a sedative. I want you resting as much as possible to see what happens if your bodies only have to concentrate on healing for the next few hours."

"Aww." Conner's hand was still held out towards Lex.

Lex lifted his hand, reached to grab at Conner's fingers. "But when we wake up, we should be okay." No more limericks, but no more sitting in a tiny room for operating, hearing about blood loss.

He watched across the way, not even looking up when the sting of the needle came. Conner was still smiling when Hope got him as well, and he yawned, watching Lex with sleepy, hooded gaze. "I can tell you more limericks," he offered, but he didn't look much better off than Lex at the moment.

"It's okay. I think..." Lex clenched his jaw a little, stifling a yawn. "Shit. Couldn't remember them now, anyway." His eyes were getting heavier, and he didn't want to let go of Conner's hand.

The last thing he remembered was Conner's voice, mumbling something in a limerick cadence, and the warm clasp of his fingertips.

* * *

  
Mmmm.

It was the first thought Conner had, a wordless sort of humming enjoyment. Warmth and soft sheets, a faint scent of something just a little spicy, nearly overwhelmed by a heavier medicinal smell that made him reluctant to open his eyes.

He really was starting to dislike hospital smells. They generally didn't mean good things, but now they meant bad, straight up, solidly bad outcomes, bad things. People he knew hurt, being hurt himself, and Conner had been poorly prepared for that. He was supposed to be a clone of _Superman_. He should never be hurt, and getting used to the new idea that he could be had been a stone cold bitch.

This wasn't, though. This was good. This was skin and cotton, and when he opened his eyes, there was Lex, looking at him.

"Hello." Lex looked awake, relaxed, and not a line between any of his expressive muscles, no tension or pain. "You're awake."

Yeah. Yeah, he was. "The meds must be completely awesome." Yeah, he'd take non-sequitors for a thousand, Alex. "So I'm guessing we made it through okay."

"Mercy's taking your blood every other hour. She says. She also says we've both had steak dinners, but I think that's a lie." Lex shifted over closer, squirmed in towards Conner with a shoulder pressed against the mattress. "There's nothing stuck in your teeth."

That made him laugh. "Yeah but I'll bet my breath's gone all to hell anyway. Uncle Jon bitches about how something crawls into his mouth and dies pretty much anytime he goes under."

"You drank water. Or, I did." Lex finally got a hand on his shoulder, smoothing over it. "I hate being afraid for you."

Sleepy blink on his part. Hm. Yeah, the drugs must be awesome, because he felt almost like a normal human being. Conner was intimately familiar with how it felt when someone had cut him open, so that was a surprise. "I concur." He definitely didn't like being afraid. "Let's not do anything stupid and have to go through all of that again."

"No, let's not." The edges of his mouth twitched at Conner. "I never want to lose you. So we need to start... being more careful. Both of us."

"We could change our names. Move to some other state." He didn't know what state, because trouble would probably still find them, and the idea of it made him want to laugh a little. College was supposed to come next for most people. Maybe they could just do that. "Or we could just figure out where to go from here." Conner stretched out each limb slowly, deliberately. "This really ought to hurt more."

"We've been sedated since yesterday. Probably the best sleep I've gotten in weeks." Because Conner had been scared and standoffish and afraid of breaking all of Lex's bones with a thought.

He finally decided that he wasn't going to severely injure himself by rolling over and getting a little closer to Lex. The fact that it didn't hurt at all was a little bizarre, but he'd take it, gladly. "Yeah. Yes." Yes, and Lex was going to be okay. Maybe Conner would, too, because Mercy wouldn't be watching him so fanatically otherwise, would she? He had no idea. Yes, though, and he watched Lex watching him with a kind of inner thrill he'd been missing for weeks.

"I think your parents want to see you. Well, Clark's parents." Lex slid an arm behind Conner's back, slow and tentative. "They've been scared for you."

"I've been scared for me," he admitted, and curled into that touch. It was slow and warm, and god. He'd been willing to die to fix Conner. That was either really romantic or screwed up, maybe both. "And you."

"I'm all right. It grows back fast." He exhaled, fingers tracing Conner's side. "Your telekinesis should be working right again."

"Did Mercy say that?" It sounded amazing, and he reached out, let his thumb caress down Lex's jaw slowly. Everything felt right, and he concentrated hard, half-closing his eyes. The responding shiver was exhilarating in ways he'd never considered possible before now. "Hm. Yeah. I think it is."

"She also said not to run into any electric fences for a few more days. Other than that..." He was cleared for lazing on the bed with Lex as much as he wanted, and that could be so good on so many levels if they hadn't just transplanted parts into him.

Morbid curiosity rose up, and he reached for the sheet, licking his upper lip. "So, it must have gone really good, then." Maybe he even still had the weird eye things going on, and a quick widening of the eyes got him x-ray. Yep. Totally awesome, and that was good.

"Well, we've been out for a whole day. And we both heal fast, now. Not as fast as I do, but you should be all right." Lex was eyeing the sheet, too, and maybe they were still that little bit post anesthetic.

"Not as fast as you do." Conner said it slowly, tasting the words. "Well. Nobody heals as fast as you." Although he was pretty sure Lex was permanently emotionally scarred, not that he'd talk about it at all.

Lex was looking at him with wide open, pleased eyes, and it was hard to deny that expression, the comfort of not being afraid of hurting him. "Lucky rest of the world, huh?"

"Lucky me." A murmur, soft and quiet, and instead of looking beneath the sheet, he leaned over and kissed Lex.

The stutter start of fingers on the back of his neck was good, feeling them flex and then grasp a little when Lex groaned and let his lips part a little for Conner. Just a bit, like it was okay to be kissing with tongues when they'd both been opened up and... and stuff, and Conner decided never to think about that again. Especially not while Lex was kissing him, since that was clearly the best thing that had ever happened to him.

"Well, I hope to god you boys have on pants. That's all I'm saying."

"Mrs. Kent!" Lex squawked, jerked back, but his arms didn't go loose around Conner. There was no holding back his grin, either, because he'd heard his aunt Martha sound serious, and that statement had sounded more like she was holding back a smirk.

"Hey, Aunt Martha. 's Uncle Jon...."

"Wheeling in behind her. You look a lot better than you have been." Jonathan paused. "I don't think I even want to know where you learned all of those limericks."

Conner blinked. "Limericks?"

"You've been spouting limericks for days. They're not really dirty, so much as blunt. Right to the point." Lex shifted, just to make the situation a little less intimacy interrupted.

"Although I've gotta say, that one about the dolphin..."

"Jonathan!"

He grinned, unrepentant. "Well, it was damn sure educational."

There were a lot of educational things in the last few days, Conner figured. After all, Lex's bodyguards had done _transplant surgery_ after some kind of crazy learning circuit thing that probably only Lex was smart enough to arrange. "That's good, 'cause I didn't even know I knew any poetry. Well, except Jabberwocky, but who doesn't know that one?"

"People who managed to avoid it in school," Lex drawled, sitting up a little and pulling the sheets around himself, slowly. It pulled sheets, gapped them so that he could peek down and see bandages on himself. The sight was something of a relief, since he wasn't sure he wanted to see holes in himself ever again.

"I didn't avoid it." It was halfhearted at best, and he yawned, still kind of sleepy. Yeah. Good meds.

Aunt Martha sat down on Lex's side of the bed and laid a hand on his upper arm. It was a little funny, watching him go all stiff and twitchy over Aunt Martha touching him. "Alex. Lex." She leaned over and kissed his forehead, despite the twitchiness. "Thank you."

He still smiled despite the twitchiness, too. "There's nothing to thank me for, Martha. I'm just glad Conner's going to be all right."

"Oh, for god's sake." Uncle Jonathan rolled closer, and Conner couldn't help grinning. "Take some credit where it's due for once." He was probably two steps from making Lex say 'you're welcome'.

"Just the once. You're welcome, then." Lex still looked uncomfortable, but that was all right as far as Jonathan was probably concerned.

That seemed to satisfy Conner's uncle -- grandfather? It was too convoluted to think about ninety-nine percent of the time, and not something he wanted to contemplate the other one percent. "You, uh." Uncle Jon cleared his throat. "You're a good boy." Reluctant, maybe, a little weird-sounding, but praise all the same. He wondered if they'd been like that when Clark was a kid, and figured probably not. Otherwise, he might have been the one in bed with Lex, and yeah, he needed to put that thought on the list of things not to think about again ever.

Never thinking it again. After all, he probably wouldn't even have been alive if it weren't for their feud. "I'm going to try to keep to it."

"I think you'll do just fine." Aunt Martha was smiling, and Conner sighed, closing his eyes. He was still a little tired, and he was deeply comfortable. It wouldn't hurt if he drifted off for a little while, and left Lex to scramble on his own.

Just for a while, he thought, and huffed out a sigh.

Not long at all.

* * *

  
Conner was sleeping.

Lex liked lazing in bed with Conner while Conner slept, but there was a point where he had to try to get back onto his feet after that abortive attempt at reconsolidating his empire. He had the time, the time to be patient, and wasn't that just something else? Time and time and time, and Conner would, too.

With Conner's new glow in the dark eyes

He'd never felt more completely smug about anything in memory, not even pissing off his father enough to get sent to Smallville. That had been pretty awesome right up until the sent-to-Smallville part.

The door cracked open near silently, and he wasn't entirely surprised to see Clark standing there. He looked a little tired, and he was wearing farm boy chic, all plaid and jeans and boots. "Hey, Lex." Quietly spoken, and Conner didn't so much as snuffle in reaction.

Lex halfway closed his laptop. He had a light shield on it, so the glow didn't get too far and light up the room. "Hello. What do you want?" Maybe it was a little pissy, but Clark made him feel that way, angry and defensive.

He moved into the room quietly and stood by the bed. "So." So. "Uh. I've been talking with Mom and Dad, and I thought it might be a good idea to come and talk with you."

"Mmhmn. That hasn't worked well so far." He didn't see Clark changing his course any time soon, either.

"I've noticed." Dry, sounding serious and quiet, and not at all like the Clark he knew. Sometimes it was deeply strange to realize that Clark was twenty years older than Lex expected, and he was a weirdly different person. "You know, it wasn't personal. Me not telling you back then. I didn't... tell anybody on purpose." Clark licked his lips. "I know you took it that way."

"I just wanted to know what I was dealing with." Lex shrugged. "I knew I hit you with my car."

Clark ducked his head, reached up and pinched his sinuses. "Yeah. You hit me with your car, and you kept the creepiest room full of crap about it ever. You... Lex. We were just a few years past that whole alien autopsy scandal, and I didn't even know what I was until you hit me."

"You could've just said. It's obvious that I knew. I kept a room full of shit on you, Clark. And you saw it. So you knew I knew, and I still trusted you. Even with you lying to my face." His memories didn't go much past that. They sort of dipped and weaved and ended with a dark-eyed woman that he knew had screwed him over somehow.

"Maybe it was easier to lie to you than it was to say out loud. I'd been a Smallville freak for fifteen years. I was used to that. Saying, 'Hey, Lex, by the way, I'm a great big alien!' was a lot harder. And your father made that even worse. You were... He would have done anything. Did do anything to you. He wouldn't have had any compunction about having _you_ autopsied, never mind me." He was so fucking earnest. "And somehow he always seemed to know everything that you were doing. Telling you seemed like the most impossible risk ever, and I was a kid. You were hardly more than one. It was a lot more complicated back then."

"Why did it go wrong when we were adults?" He pressed it, demanded to know. Had to know.

Clark licked his lips. "I think we got into a habit with things, and then we didn't know how to change it. How to break out." His gaze skittered to Conner. "How to be honest about things."

"I never wanted anything but for you to tell me. And then you were so superior. You just... stepped in and saved the day and never helped people grow," Lex snapped.

There was a suspicious slant when Clark looked at him again, a creepy blue tinge to his eyes. Clark opened his mouth, and that was when Conner huffed and turned over, burrowing his head against Lex's side as if to block out the sound of them.

"And not all of the heroes you work with do it that way. I know I was completely unhinged, but Wayne has Wayne Enterprises. Oliver Queen has foundations. They seed bits of technology and developments back to society so there's growth. You just... save the day. And leave. And Conner does, too, but... But he trusts me."

And that made all the difference in the world. All of it, and he wished Clark would go away again. Just fuck off and disappear like he was inclined to do. Instead, he sat there, watching Conner, watching Lex, and finally said quietly, "I know. And maybe that will make all the difference, but you and me.... At the very least, maybe we need to call a truce."

"The fact that you even feel you have to say that, Clark. I'm not at war with you. I haven't done shit to you. You scare me." He just wanted Clark to stop getting in his face. "I donate an organ to Conner, and you come into my house to confront me about it."

The look on his face was worth it. "I didn't mean...."

"Yes, you did."

"If you're gonna fight, both of you go do it outside," Conner grumbled, and pushed his face harder against Lex's side.

"Sorry." Lex shifted his hand, stroking at Conner's side because he could. Because it felt good, and Conner made him feel all right. "Before you say we should have a truce, you should look at the way you act."

Clark sighed and shoved a hand through his hair. "I'm trying."

"Then don't stop." Lex shifted, squirmed down a little in the sheets. "And it should be all right."

An arm looped around his waist and tugged at him, and he started to put down the tiny laptop. It was surprising to find that Clark took it and carefully set it down on the night stand, getting up from the side of the bed. "I hope so."

"I just want to try to enjoy my life. I didn't do enough of that the last time." He'd indulged, yes, but there was drunken party indulgence and orgies just for him and drugs and alcohol and none of them had ever filled the void. Once upon a time, he'd thought that Clark could.

Now, he knew that Conner could.

"No, you didn't. Your father's dead now, though, and I think a lot of things combined will make that difference. Go to sleep. Mercy's probably coming to get me anyway."

"She probably is." He halfway wanted to think of it as taking out the trash but it wasn't. Clark was good; he just hadn't been good to Lex. He was very good at holding a grudge, but maybe the Other him wouldn't want that. Maybe he, maybe Lex, wanted a complete fresh start, with Clark as nothing more than the remnants of that old life. He wondered if he'd planned that he'd end up here, with Conner, like this. Lex didn't know if he'd really thought that was possible, but it seemed like the Other him would have plotted to infinite degree if that was what he wanted. Unless he found those plans, he'd never know, and he found himself thinking that he didn't care, either.

"Lex." Clark tilted his head and looked at him, really looked, the way Lex knew and missed. "I hope it all works out this time." He didn't say that if Lex broke Conner's heart, he'd kill him. He doubtless would, though.

If he broke Conner's heart, it might kill him all by itself. "I think it will."

Thought so. Hoped so, and maybe belief in and of itself was the first step. "Get some rest," Clark offered, and turned to head for the door.

Leaving them alone, and maybe he would. "See, not too much fighting," he told Conner quietly.

One blue eye peeked up at him through bedraggled hair. "Well. It's gotta be an improvement over blowing up buildings." He was still muzzy, but he pulled Lex closer, snuggled against him. He threw off enough heat that it was soporific, and inclined Lex to doze with him.

It was a lot like enjoying his life.

* * *

  
Lingering in the loft and looking down at Conner while he flung hay around with a pitchfork was a nice way to spend an afternoon.

"So, how much hay do the cows eat?"

Looking up at him, Conner grinned. He wasn't even sweating, and that was at least a little disgusting. "They're pretty fond of it, so a lot. I'm almost finished here, though. It's a good day for playing hooky when I'm done, I think."

Lex had a handkerchief for wiping his own forehead and he wasn't even doing anything. "I enjoy playing hooky with you."

The smirk that Conner leveled his way said more than his silence as he finished with the pitch fork and then moved a few bales of high into a corner. "There we go. All done. You wanna go somewhere and make out in your tiny no-back-seat car?"

Lex adored his car. He adored it for the speed and the fact that he could take the hard top off and turn it into a convertible. "No. I like the making out suggestion, just not in something where neither of us have leg room." They weren't exactly short, and the weird growth spurt while Conner had been sick had edged him up so that he was a couple of inches taller than Lex. Making out should involve sheets and the biggest bed imaginable, all of which they could find.

Conner was watching him thoughtfully. "Hey, aren't your girlfriends doing physicals at the D.C. Justice League building today?"

"Why yes, which leaves the castle all to us," Lex murmured, leaning a little more on the railing. That grin was on his list of favorite things ever, and he launched himself up until he was flying in the open air right in front of Lex.

"In which case, it would probably be a mortal sin not to take advantage of it. Don't you think?"

"I think so." He still felt an urge to tell the Kents where they were going, just to cover their tracks, just to leave a path, a trail. Just so no one panicked. Funny. He'd never felt any obligation to tell his dad where he was going.

Conner laughed and slid over the rail, slipping an arm around Lex's waist. "In which case, you wanna drive or you wanna go over there my way?"

"Drive. You can run in and tell Martha where we're off to." At some point. At some point they were going to have to 'grow up' so to speak, but Lex didn't want to, not yet. His moves to rebuild his empire were few but solid and sane and well planned, and that was enough. He much preferred the move of Conner's arm around him, the way he leaned in and bussed a quick kiss against Lex's mouth.

"Mhm. I'll meet you at the car." He slid away gently, and then he was gone in a rush of wind that made Lex laugh, because things were back to normal. Whatever that meant.

Conner was bright and healthy and he'd missed that while they'd tried to figure out what was wrong. He'd missed Conner feeling free and easy with himself.

It made the walk down the loft stairs surprisingly easy, relaxed while he dug in his pants pocket for keys. Conner was already sitting in the passenger side when he got there, and so he slid behind the wheel and brought the Porsche purring to life. "So. If we're not going to be making out in the car...."

"Bedroom." The sheets were that particular shade of purple he still rather liked, and the mattress was huge and comfortable, which Conner knew because they'd spent enough time lazing there in recovery. Well, enough time for them. Him, and Conner now, too. The TTK was back in full force, and something else. Lots of something elses, a genetic jackpot of them, because he didn't heal as fast as Lex, but it was close, and the changes in his physiology during those weeks of aging had brought him a little closer to fully grown. The powers he'd developed from Kryptonian DNA had intensified.

Lex wondered why Other him hadn't granted him those powers. He could have, obviously, but he hadn't. It was probably for the best, but he would have thought Other him might have wanted those powers very badly. Maybe he'd realized they would've been the wrong hands to put them in. It was hard to guess what Other him had and hadn't been thinking when he'd done what he'd done. It made his head hurt a little.

It didn't stop him from putting the car in reverse, turning in his seat to back out of the drive. By the time they hit pavement, Conner was unbuttoning the plaid shirt he'd been wearing, giving Lex a wicked grin, as if being shirtless in his car was a start on the many, many times he'd asked for make out sessions in it. Lex kept trying to watch the road, but he couldn't help glancing over to see Conner's chest, except there wasn't skin for him to see. Instead, there was a black t-shirt with a big red S shield on it, and Conner laughed. "Do you know how hard it is, getting in and out of the suit? Plus, I've got this new boyfriend. I think all of the primary colors kind of injure his delicate sensibilities."

"I like the big shield. It's subtle. Not much of an alter ego, though." But maybe not splitting himself in half to the world was important.

Conner shrugged. "I'll be careful not to wear the t-shirt anyplace else. Clark's got some kind of crazy Kryptonian image generator. It's behind the belt buckle." One finger poked at it, and wow. That was a little creepy -- all sharp edges, blazing cerulean eyes, nothing like Conner's rounded cheeks and storm-blue gaze. "It's all about hiding in plain sight, I think."

Lex reached over, and poked it again, turning it off. "Clearly. I prefer you just as you are, but I understand the need to differentiate."

It was clear that Conner liked the fact that Lex liked him the way he was. He ducked his head a little shyly, lashes dropping down flirtatiously. Tease. "That's good to know."

"You're lucky I'm driving." He pulled at the belt buckle, liking the faint blush steeling over Conner's nose.

"And what would you do if you weren't?" There was no effort to stop him; Conner just shifted a little closer, turning Lex's way to make it easier for him to tug the buckle open, slowly slip the leather free. One hand snuck down to slip the button of his jeans loose as well.

"Strip you naked in the car," Lex half promised, half threatened. He didn't know what else he'd do, what he'd do once he got Conner in bed. They'd just have to see. It seemed like forever since that golden afternoon in the loft, pressed tightly to one another. Every touch, every caress, seemed to linger in his mind, and he couldn't help huffing a breath at the memory.

Conner whined as Lex slipped his hand in past his zipper, molded his dick through soft cotton. "Oh god. I'd love to be naked in your car. On your car. Blowing you or...."

Lex closed his eyes for a moment, and exhaled slowly. "Yeah. We should get inside as soon as we get to the castle." Because Conner's skin was hot hot hot and he wanted to do more than just hug and laze. He wanted things that he hadn't thought about in weeks, months, all of that sun-warmed body available to him for things that defied description.

"It's a... oh god. Oh. That's. Oh, wow." Wow, as if that was an adequate descriptor for what Lex was doing with his fumbling right hand.

He pulled it back because he was going to need it to pull into the driveway and the garage. "Hold on, better to wait a moment."

The full-body shudder that rippled through Conner was deeply gratifying. "God, no, it's not better to wait. Waiting sucks, Lex." Not Alex. He'd never really be Alex, because nobody could remember to call him that. He couldn't remember to call himself that, either.

"We can have naked sex in the kitchen if you want. As long as we're inside."

It would be funny if it wasn't so serious -- Conner's shaking hand on his thigh, the way he ducked in close to him. "Naked sex? In the kitchen? Or just... pretty much anywhere so long as we're inside?"

"Anywhere as long as we're inside." Because there was no other staff and it was just them. He hadn't been alone with someone and feeling safe about it in possibly his entire life.

Even past what he remembered, given what he knew about at least one ex-wife.

He pulled into the driveway, and it surprised him that Conner was pulling away, tugging his shirt closed again. "You said once you wanted candlelight. A little more time to get where we were going. I'm thinking maybe we could go with that."

"We can do that, too." The urge to rush, just to want and give in to wanting, was there, and pressing hard, though. Still, Lex turned the engine off when he pulled into his parking space.

Conner was looking at him, leaning close, licking his lips. "Tell me. Tell me what you want, Lex. I'll do...." His voice shook just a little, grating darkly. "I'll do anything you want."

"I just want you. Just you. Simple." Easy, no complications, nothing weird or special needed. He started to unbuckle his seat belt, exhaling a little. Conner did the same, and they stepped out of the car side by side, at the same speed. It made him wonder if Conner was reluctant or maybe having second thoughts, at least until his door shut and he walked around the car to catch Lex's hand, tugging him towards the garage entrance of the castle.

He didn't know why Conner would be having second thoughts, but if he wanted to... "Candles might be a little cheesy."

"Soap opera-ish." It was solemnly spoken, but then he grinned. "Besides. It's still mid-afternoon." His fingers twitched in Lex's. "We'll be able to see everything anyway."

Lex stretched his fingers wide, and then clenched tight to Conner's hand. "We'll open the curtains, then. And not put Barry White on the stereo."

And then the world sped up around him, a whir of air and a blur of stone and warm wood paneling, all resolving in the upstairs bedroom they'd been using after the transplant. "Okay. No Barry White."

Lex laughed when Conner set him down, tugging at his hands. "T-shirt and jeans aren't that challenging to get off of you."

God, he loved that smile. "That was kind of a consideration in the costume change, truth be told. So." He leaned in, breath soft and warm against Lex's lips. "You wanna maybe get them off of me now? Or I could get your clothes off of you instead."

"A little of A, a little of B?" Lex pulled at the flannel shirt, slowly unbuttoning it. There were fingers at his own waist, dragging his shirt loose from his pants in uneven little tugs. He wasn't surprised when Conner leaned in closer and kissed him, slow and sweet, all mouth and no tongue.

Just enjoyment, pure and simple. It was funny to feel the way his mouth curved, the press of lip against lip so he could taste Conner while he pushed the flannel off of his shoulders. There was a touch of lunch there -- dessert, pound cake and strawberries -- and a low hum of Conner's voice, a murmur of sound that said he liked the way things were going.

Fingers tripped up his chest, buttons opening or flying loose in their path, teasing their way over Lex's chest. No scars, nothing there to show his history, to show what he had given to Conner. It was wiped clean, perfect in reality and different only in memories. But Conner was solid, and that solidness wasn't going to be wiped away with healing. Lex broke the kisses, let his mouth linger against the edge of Conner's, drifting to his cheek, his jaw.

"Oh, that's... that's...." Good, he hoped, and Conner dropped his head back, his fingers clenching in Lex's shirt. The material ripped, shredded, and Lex didn't care. "Do that again, that... right there, that." That, a bite to the throat, sharp and nipping, and Lex repeated it, feeling Conner shudder with pleasure when he did it. "Oh god."

"Tell me how that feels," Lex urged. "I want to know, I want to hear it." In sounds and moans and groans all of it. Every step of the way with Conner's head tipped back to expose his neck to Lex.

"I don't. I can't... fuuuuck." Slow and softly spoken, but Lex could feel it, the way Conner shivered in reaction. "Oh. Oh god. Just. Just don't stop. Don't stop, don't stop, don't..." Mmmm. Perfect. Perfect, and Lex slid his hands up beneath Conner's t-shirt, tracing the line of his spine, making him gasp in reaction.

Every bit was there beneath his hands, and it was a hell of a way to peel up Conner's shirt, stretching the fabric against his stomach while it hitched up. it gave him plenty to focus on while Conner worked on undressing him, or more like ripping his shirt off in slow, steady strips.

"I like that spot," he murmured when Lex finally moved away licking the hollow of his throat instead. "That's a really good spot."

"I want to catalogue you," Lex decided, pulling away so he could pull Conner's t-shirt up over his head if Conner was going to let him. "I want to know every spot and why and how."

"Okay." The sound was muffled by cotton, and then he was out, hair ruffled, face flushed as he reached for the catch of Lex's pants. The first set slid loose easily, but he definitely lost the hidden button to those shaking fingers. "Okay to everything. Anything. Whatever you want."

Standing there in his underwear with Conner agreeing to whatever he wanted. It was heady, intoxicating, and he stepped out of his pants, pausing to toe off his shoes. "We should move to the bed. I..."

"Anything," Conner promised him again, and his hands were on his jeans, and they were on the floor, too, underwear with them, the whole nine yards. "I want you. I want you to... anything." A solemn vow, and Lex leaned in and bit him again, and Conner's dick bounced in reaction, smacking against Lex's belly.

"Anything? Cover you in peanut butter?" Lex leaned back a little, licked the bite mark that wasn't firm at all.

The vaguely confounded expression was fun. "Well. Peanut butter seems like it might get kind of sticky." Then he thought about it a little further. "So long as we're not talking about using it for lube, I'm good with it. I was maybe hoping for a little less gooey and more..."

Straight forward, and Lex edged Conner back towards the bed, shucking off his underwear. "I just wanted to see how far anything went." Maybe not as far as batteries and heated lubes, but Lex was of the opinion that a man had to save a few things for the future in any given relationship. He'd just never really had a relationship with much of one.

The flush that chased across Conner's nose made him lean forward and press a kiss to the tip of it, and yeah. Yeah, he liked that. "Well, if you wanna get technical about it... I'm not just a pretty face. I know about all kinds of things. Peanut butter's just a new one."

"All kinds of things, huh? Interested in elaborating with show and not tell?" He hadn't really pressed, hadn't really asked Conner what he'd done and with whom because if Lex asked that then he needed to reciprocate, and that would require a historian and an archeologist. Neither of which Hope and Mercy would volunteer to help with.

It was better just to kiss Conner again, and kneel over his hips when he finally laid down on the bed. It was a little funny, he supposed, the way Conner gave in to him, let him have whatever he wanted. Maybe it was just being greedy, being willing for almost anything, or maybe it was him wanting Lex to lead the way. Whichever it was, Lex was all right with it, especially when Conner's hands smoothed down his sides, heat radiating from his shaking fingers. "If you want."

"I can't remember right now who's promised who blowjobs." Lex mused, leaning forward. Shaking fingers, like he was scared or excited or nervous, when there was really no way to screw it up just then. Not really. Martha Kent walking in would only forestall the inevitable.

"Blowjobs are awesome, but I was kind of hoping for us to get a little further than that. Blowjobs should probably be reserved for the Porsche." Conner's determination to make out with Lex in the car only made him smile. "Well. That is. If you wanted. Otherwise..." He squirmed, and that could be an indication that blowjobs would be appreciated, or that he'd be glad to indulge Lex.

"Sometimes I think you only want me for my taste in cars," Lex scoffed, shifting back a little. He planted a hand firmly on Conner's stomach, just soaking it in. "You've never really gone this far, have you?"

Sheepish looked good on him. "Well. Mostly, I'm a boob man. I mean. It's just... it never came up, exactly. Not that I'm not completely equal opportunity about it," he blurted, "just. Uh."

"I converted a straight guy?" Lex's mouth twitched a little as he slid his hand up, and ran a thumb over Conner's left nipple. It gained him a hitch of breath and an arch of the back that was nice to see.

The indignant look was a win, too. "Have you _seen_ you? You could probably convert snails. Not that you did that, it's not like I haven't done some things, it's just that... well. Before you, it was easier with girls, kind of. I mean, who would I ask out, anyway? Tim? And don't even say Bart. I don't want to laugh until I fall off the bed."

"Limited social circle, right." And then Lex had fallen into his lap, brother-in-cloning arms. He leaned down, kissed the skin just to the side of Conner's nipple. "So if I take the lead..."

"I'm pretty sure I can follow." The breathless way Conner spoke was so tempting, his warm palms sliding up Lex's back to settle on his shoulder blades. "Although if you just wanna keep on like we've been going, I'm okay with that. You know. If the other doesn't interest you or...."

"I, uh..." Really didn't think about that on purpose, as much as possible, but he shifted and focused on the hands on his shoulder blades. "I think I'd rather be on top. For a while."

A squirm and Conner was pulling him up, tugging him close enough to kiss, warm lips and tongue and tenderness. "I'm okay with that. I mean, I've been offering for a while now."

"You might not like it, actually," Lex suggested. "It's not that everyone loves it." He'd liked it, for a long time. A _long_ time, imagined how it could be with Clark, wanted that. It wasn't the time or place for that memory, though, not with Conner looking up at him, expression deeply serious.

He wasn't surprised by the answer, either. "Well, we won't know until we try it, will we?"

"That's a pretty promising answer." He kissed Conner again, lingered with it, the taste, the feel. No one could fake that response, and that was something Lex locked away when he pulled back a little to kiss at Conner's collarbone. It didn't earn the same weak-kneed reaction that biting that spot just underneath the hinge of his jaw got him, but the low sound humming in Conner's chest was nice.

"The answer's yes, Lex. Like, all the time, yes." Without any kind of reservation or qualifier, and when his thumb swiped back and forth over Conner's left nipple, it got him even better sounds. "Nnnnn!"

"Next time I do this, I'll have a notebook and a diagram ready," Lex threatened, shifting to follow his thumb with teeth.

The shiver that gained him was definitely a good thing. "Oh, god." He seemed almost worshipful. "A notebook? And a diagram? That. That's just kinky." Kinky, maybe, but the invisible stroking telekinetic fingers soothing their way up his spine probably were, too.

"Pin it on a wall. Render it in three dimensions. The Eroticism of Conner Kent." Lex closed his eyes, and lapped at that nipple with his tongue, lazy as he savored it. It was pebble-hard, and every tiny motion of Lex's mouth made his hips rock up, a steady, shuddery little motion. Every time he nipped, teeth just grazing, the unsteady touch of Conner's power would fizzle away into almost nothing, and when he bit down a little harder, Conner pulled his hands away and fisted them at his sides, groaning.

The telekinetic hands felt suspiciously like the real hands, warm and lingering and teasing just the right way. Oddly reassuring. "You'd like that. If only we ever saw it."

Conner laughed breathlessly and shifted underneath him. "It's in your head now, good as printed out. I'll see it one day. Hmmmm." Blue eyes peered down, peeping from beneath black lashes. "You wanna find other spots to map out?"

"I have a good idea of the road ahead, just not the best rest-stops," Lex murmured, shifting over to his other nipple. Just because he could.

"Tease." Yes, a little. Slow and steady was good for him, and would make it better for Conner in the long run, even if he'd probably prefer to run ahead full-tilt. He was still pushing up, cock rubbing against Lex's belly in a steady rocking motion that only wavered a little when Lex nipped again.

Pressure and different sensations were throwing Conner all over the place, and Lex liked those reactions, liked that Conner was open and whining and easy to guess. Guileless was maybe the better word, but trusting and honest, and he could live with that. With the touch of him, the reality of him, the taste and feel and Conner's hands were at his side, fingers twitching wildly.

"Please." Please, and he said it so prettily, face flushed, eyes slitted open. "Please don't tease. Please, Lex, I want..." Wanted more, that was clear.

"What do you want? There's a lot, a _lot_ , we can do together..." And Conner wasn't entirely sure, so he was teasing him a little by asking that, wondering just what Conner imagined Lex might do to him, given infinite time and all the comfort they wanted.

The lick of those lips, the tip of that tongue, was luscious. Made his pulse pick up and his hips shove forwards, gaining him a gasp. "I want you to fuck me." Dirty word, accompanied by a squirm beneath him that was demanding.

"Hold on. Let me get something to use as lube..." Which meant leaving Conner, but probably not to go far. Hell, Hope and Mercy had probably stocked the bathroom with something they could use. They'd certainly encouraged him enough.

He'd move worlds for that grin. "No. Just hang on, I think I can..." Fizzle of power against his skin, stretching, extending away from them, away from the bed and their bodies. Away, and he wanted to laugh when Conner pouted. "I can't see them to find out the one I want."

"I'm not using toothpaste," Lex warned, leaning down to kiss him. "Just wait a second."

The whining when he moved away was certainly gratifying. "I didn't want you to go away." But he was letting go, letting Lex move away even if his eyes followed every naked motion. It was strange to feel comfortable walking around naked. Safe to walk around naked, and he'd done a lot of walking around naked Before. He didn't want to think about Before, which now had two parts. Before Conner and Before, the Other him.

It was a hell of a thing to trip over while he walked to get lube, and he decided to tuck that thought away, hide it for sometime later. A rummage through the bathroom turned up pineapple lube, some kind of cinnamon lube, and something in vanilla.

Clearly Hope and Mercy spent far too much time considering the matter. It would be disturbing if he wasn't pretty sure he heard Conner in the other room, starting again without him.

He picked up all three, and turned to head back towards the bedroom. "Am I missing anything?"

Conner's knee was bent, foot flat on the bed. One hand was on his cock and the other was near his mouth, fingers sliding in, spit slick, before he gave Lex a look and slid it further down, sneaking, sliding between his legs, and oh. Ohhh.

"Not much." Husky voiced, and fuck. Oh. "Just the things I do when I get a chance to think of you and I'm alone. Nnnn."

"That looks so much better than lube right now." He started forward, a knee on the mattress so he could get up there with Conner, get close to his legs, those delving fingers. The lube ended up dropped on the bed, though he grabbed carefully for the vanilla one. "Keep your fingers there and wait a moment."

"Oh. God. You say that like it's easy." Conner was biting his lip, hips rocking, the hand on his cock slow and easy, the finger teasing at his ass moving, pushing, making way for the second one, and he gave a raw sound that made heat rush up Lex's spine. "Oh god."

"You don't wait well." He half chided that, smearing a little lube onto two fingers of his own, leaning against Conner's knee a little. He could probably move a little more quickly, but the view was delicious, and when Conner's voice cracked, whole body arching up, he shivered.

"Please." One hand moved away, stopped touching, knotted in the sheets instead of stroking Conner's dick. "I want... I need, I... Lex, _please_."

"Move your hand." He tapped at Conner's wrist, because lube felt so much better than spit, even if it looked hotter. And to maybe get Conner going, he slid his slicked fingers between Conner's legs, and tapped his knuckles. It made him tense, made his entire body shudder underneath Lex's touch, but he pulled them loose all the same, moved it carefully to his side to safely clutch at the covers instead.

Brilliant blue gaze, wanton, pleading, searing into him. He felt like he could do anything, anything at all, so long as Conner kept looking at him that way. "Please, Lex."

"I want to take my time." He pressed those two fingers in firmly, not because he really thought Conner needed the prep, but because he wanted to, because he wanted to touch and stroke and stretch Conner out all by himself. Wanted to feel him, and Conner gave him the most delicious sound, legs sprawling open, head dropping back.

"Oh god. Oh god, oh fuck, oh god. Oh that. That. Oh my god, Lex. I, I can't, I, oh, that's.. oh god." His eyes were shut, and he shifted steadily beneath Lex's fingers. "Oh god, please."

"Soon." When he was ready, and that was what Conner got for lighting his fuse while Lex was out of the room. Too hot and bothered too soon, and Lex was going to let him simmer. Stew and writhe under his touch, moving and rocking up to his touch, and oh, that was so good. The clutch of his ass, the way he bit his lip and clenched his fists, trying not to reach for Lex, grab him too hard.

"Please. Please, please, ple... oh god. Oh my god."

"This is what sex should be," Lex promised, leaning down to kiss Conner's hip, pulling his fingers out.

"Noooo." Oh, yes, and he nuzzled against the bone, thumb trailing sweetly, slickly over that hole. Gentle, easy, a steady glide, and Conner was looking at him, lips trembling. "Lex. Lex, don't stop, don't...."

"Are you sure? I might need to stop to swap my hand for me...." So relaxed, though, so easy, the faint twitching spasm of Conner's ass around his finger almost anticipation.

Conner gave a full-body shudder and reached down, tugging at him. "Please. Yes, fuck, please, Lex, I want. I want so much just... please."

He eased his fingers back, slowly, taking his time. They left slick trails up the inside of Conner's thigh while he sat back, smiling at Conner. "You ask, and you shall receive."

"Could I maybe receive a little faster? Because really. Lex. Lex, I want... please, just fuck me, fuck me blind, make me yell, make me want to be doing this with you forever, I...."

"No expectations. Performance anxiety?" Lex exhaled, and knelt, got comfortable between Conner's legs because he could. "Thankfully I don't get performance anxiety."

The sudden grin he got, just a little crooked, lips red from Conner biting them, made him smile back automatically. "Lex. It's... I want you. I do. I want to try this, and I want... I think... I just..." He closed his eyes and huffed a breath, almost a laugh. "I want to finish a sentence, but more than anything, I just want you."

"Okay." He wanted Conner, Conner wanted him, and it was easy to slick himself up and try to position himself. Just slide up, cock slippery as it delved between those cheeks, searching until he felt the right spot. From there, Lex took a deep breath and looked up, catching his eyes. It didn't surprise him when one strong, broad hand fumbled its way up and caught his, Conner watching him just as steadily.

Lick of lips, and then he breathed it again. "I just want you."

Whoever he was. Not quite Lex Luthor, but not entirely separate either, and all the old urges were there, except. Except he had someone to trust, and it took the pressure off of the feeling of expectation when he started to push in. "Mmmh, I think I have you, Conner..."

God. God, tight, and hot, and Conner's eyes were half-closed as he panted, quick, sharp breaths, his back arching away and then towards him. "Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck, Lex. Lex...."

Lex ran a hand down Conner's thigh, just easing in slowly while he bent in. "So tight, Conner, you feel so good." All his, all Lex's, and it felt good to have something that the Other him hadn't had. Something, someone, he knew would stay with him. It made him shiver, and then Conner made a _sound_ , breathed hard again. He got a leg around Lex's hip, pulled him in and pushed up hard at the same time, trying to get more of him.

"Oh god!" Oh, god, yes, and he was nearly bottomed out, Conner's eyes closed tightly, brows furrowed. "Oh shit, that's. That's."

Lex laughed, twisting his hips a little, leaning in over him because the squeeze of Conner's leg felt good. "You feel amazing."

"You're so." His voice shook, and the satisfying flash of almost-red beneath the thin membranes of his eyelids made Lex moan. "Oh god. So hard. So big, so fucking... oh my god." Like it was all he could think to say, and his fingers tightening almost painfully around Lex's.

Lex stretched his fingers, easing his hand free so he could slide it over Conner's chest, steady himself that way, still touching all the time. "I'm hardly moving. Are you all right?" Beautiful underneath him, very faintly dewed with perspiration, bitten lips open and tempting.

"Y-yeah." Not all that convincing, but then he rolled his hips, slow and a little jerky, and that mouth formed a perfect O, making Lex want to laugh. "Oh FUCK, yes."

He leaned up just a little more, pulling out of Conner a fraction just so he could kiss him, kiss those reddened lips, slide his tongue between them while he gave a thrust again. Conner shuddered beneath him, and then opened to him, relaxing as if that was all he'd needed. A moan vibrated between their mouths, and he pushed in again, easy and slower than Conner wanted. He wanted to take the time Conner deserved, really take the time, even if Conner was moving too fast for himself and surprised himself with how good it felt. "I'll move soon. I promise. I just want to feel you." Feel the way he clenched, quaked, moved in jerky little motions as if wanting more and not knowing how to get it.

"Wanna feel you tomorrow. Next week. You're so.. it feels like you're just..." Just something, and then he moaned again, spread his arms wide, fists clenched as if he was afraid to touch Lex for fear he couldn't control himself.

"We will." Again and again, because he couldn't say no to intimacy with Conner, didn't want to say no to that comfort, the heat he got when he shifted and rocked his hips back gently.

"Oh, god." Fervent, and Lex could feel his body rising a little, getting into perfect alignment, his fists loosing to clutch at the sheets and hold on. "Oh my god, Lex, oh my god, would you please just..." Just fuck him, maybe, probably, but his eyes were closed tightly, his face desperately flushed. His cock stood up between them, brushing against Lex's belly and leaving a sticky trail with each touch.

"Taking my time," Lex murmured, leaning back a little, letting his hands trail down to Conner's hips, lifting him a little for traction. He slid out and then pushed in again, small degrees of motion that earned him delicious, frantic little noises, a vague flail with one hand.

It wasn't any kind of protest; just impatience, inexperience. Wantonness, maybe, and that was so good. "Evil," Conner whimpered, but then he brought up that flailing hand and cupped the back of Lex's neck to pull him in for a kiss.

It was a grounding touch, and Lex wanted that contact, the lingering of Conner's skin against his that made what they were doing more than just an act. In and out, in and out that was so much more, felt so damn good to Lex that he was panting when he broke the kiss and thrust hard again. Conner gave him the sweetest moan and bucked up underneath him, body doing things that defied the laws of physics and somehow made it even better. He was so hot, inside and out, clutching tightly around Lex's dick and making it hard to keep control of himself. And why bother? He could move and just let control slip without hurting Conner, and he didn't think that was possible in the first place, not like that. "Come on, just a little more..."

"Touch me!" His eyes flashed open, blue-blue-blue, rimmed in red fire. "Touch me, Lex, touch me, I want..." They slammed shut again and he pushed up hard, taking Lex all the way in again and yelling loudly enough that it made Lex frantic.

He didn't have Conner's extra hands, telepathic touch, but he could slide his hands over Conner's skin and just thrust, half holding onto him while he thrust, pushed, so close. His teeth were clenched, entire body focused on the one beneath him, and when he felt the invisible field slip between them, enfold Conner's cock, that was so hot. Conner's head rocked back and forth on the pillow, almost as if he was trying to deny that he was going to come, and then he did. Spilled between them, hot and sticky, and he clamped down around Lex in rhythmic, shivering waves of reaction, gasping for breath.

Lex went with it, fell with it, thrust into Conner while he came, with no, no fear or worry that something was going to happen to him other than that he could lie down on top of Conner and breathe and enjoy the heat.

They existed there together for long moments, touching and sweaty, aftershocks of pleasure spilling through him Conner's fingers tracing down his sides firmly enough not to tickle. Slow, lazy kisses, warmth, quiet murmurs of love. In all of his memories, Lex had never had anything like it, and he knew he'd do whatever he had to do in order to keep it.

He wanted that, forever. Enjoyment and lazing, and kisses, no pain, no one trying to take him apart, physically or metaphorically, and he knew that he would never have to worry about that with Conner.

* * *

  
The guy was huge.

Actually, huge was the understatement of the century, and Kon El knew it. He lived with a guy who thought understated was a way of life except when it came to his cars.

"Whoa!" He hated it when they threw things. It meant he had to catch whatever it was or else it was going to keep going, go worse. There'd be a lot more damage to the city, and Lex hated seeing perfectly good cities damaged. It generally meant that he felt obliged to fix it, and...

And the second huge chunk of concrete went whizzing past Kon. Shit.

"Got it!" Well, it was about time.

"This thing just keeps moving!" Kon yelled, dropping the first chunk as gently as possible. It still made a hell of a mess out of the sidewalk. "I can't get him to stop!"

"What've you tried?" He could hear the pneumatic sounds of Lex's supersuit, faint but present, the electronics and fascinating technowizardry in which Lex liked to revel.

"More like what haven't I tried." Kon hovered, frowning as the behemoth kept right on moving, scattered bank notes fluttering behind it. Him. Whatever. "Speed doesn't trip him up, hitting him doesn't work, and heat vision just pissed him off. That's when he started throwing chunks of masonry at me."

"Tried throwing them back?" Pile on the guy, sure that'd work when he had enough chunks of masonry to actually bury the dude and oh. Oh, there was an idea right there. Lex had his force field netting in his hands. "If you can distract him with a rock to the head..."

He couldn't keep the grin off of his face. "Got it." A long swooping parabola, and Kon came face to face with the guy, snatching up the closest chunk of building material. It was about basketball sized, so just right "Hey! Bonehead!"

That got its attention, all right, and Kon sent the lump flying at its head, just a little faster than physics probably ought to allow.

That was all right since physics had problems with Kon and Lex and force field nets with self-sustaining energy sources and supersuits in really freakshow hideous purple and green, like reverse Joker, only Kon El knew never to say that to Lex.

Though if Lex were colorblind, it would've explained a lot.

As soon as the guy went down, Lex threw out the net, though there was a good chance it wouldn't stop him, but just slow him down. Their luck being what it was, that was exactly what happened. One of these days, Kon was seriously going to have the Fortress run statistics on shit just like this.

"So now what?" It wasn't that he was stupid; it was that Lex thought so fast he usually had the answer before Kon had gotten halfway there. He'd long since declared that there was no shame in letting Lex do the planning while he did the heavier lifting.

They were a good team that way, and pretty seamless. "Dammit." Lex brought up the control panel on his arm, and started to tweak it, manipulating the force field as they followed him. "Don't know where he thinks he's going -- can you hit the net with heat vision?"

"I think he thinks he's going wherever the hell he wants." Still, he narrowed his eyes, furrowed his brow, and there it was, a wave of heat spreading out and hitting the net.

Some things sounded like an incredibly bad idea, but Lex knew the limit of his own tech. The heat vision sent a skitter of fizzling energy all over the net, and the guy just sort of fell over, causing the surrounding area to quake in an unstable shimmy.

"That only leaves the usual question: Now what?" Lex didn't really think prison for people like that worked, and death was too good for some, or possibly that there needed to be rehab. It was a standard argument that neither of them really felt an urge to get too heated about because they weren't in charge of anything except their own territory.

The world was a vastly different place in the future than Kon had ever really thought it would be. He couldn't help making _Firefly_ jokes about it, and Lex always snapped back something smarmy about _Bladerunner_ , at least before the really bad sequels. "Well. We could probably call the Bats." They'd incorporated, and frankly, they were creepy as fuck, but they had some pretty good prisons. Nothing like Arkham had been in the old days. "Or we could call Superman."

"I'll call Kal." He floated a little closer to Kon, apparently still securing the problem. He'd be there faster than the Bats would, and if Kon had to say anything it'd be that he worried about Kal sometimes.

Everything changed except Kal. The world changed around him, and he'd never gotten over Lois getting old and dying. Maybe he'd never gotten over Aunt Martha and Uncle Jonathan dying, either, but Lois had been the real kicker. Kal had just... stopped aging one day. A few gray streaks, maybe, but he'd stopped getting older, and maybe Kal wasn't able to deal with that the way Kon had. Kon had never known anything else, and he knew that he was lucky.

He had Lex.

They weren't always saving the day. Sometimes they got battered and tired and gave up for a while. Farmed or ran a bookshop, or just did something mundane. At least until Lex had some new piece of technology explode. It never really got old for Kon, spending the rest of their lives together.

Gently, Kon settled down, landing on both feet. The net was still fizzling with energy, and the huge frigging guy was out for the count. A hand into his pocket got him Lex's crazy cuffs, and he grabbed one wrist and then the other, wrapping them around and then locking them into place. Still unconscious, which made Kon happy. Lex came down to stand beside him on the street, and there were sirens closing in at last. It at least meant that when Kal got there they wouldn't have any loud public arguments. He used to think they'd get over it one day. He'd stopped believing it sometime around his fiftieth birthday. Maybe because that had ended with cake on Lex's head and in Kal's ear, and Lois wheezing laughter from the end of the table.

Lois had been one cool lady, so it wasn't really surprising that Kal was lingering heartbroken. "There, that's that."

Unless the guy managed to get up and get moving again, anyway. Still, it was probably true. Kon turned towards Lex and grinned. "My hero." And he was. He really was, in so many ways. He'd saved Kon's ass from the very beginning, and saved him from a long, miserable existence alone.

"I am." Lex was looking down at the body, not really willing to relax yet, but afterwards, when they got home....

Kal touched down a few feet away in a swirl of black and blue and red. The costume had changed when Lois died, and Lex and Kon had gotten Metropolis and most of the midwest with it. "Interesting day."

"You could call it that. We aren't sure what to do with him. Hate to hand him over to the Bats." God, there were days when Kon missed Tim so bad he wasn't sure how he made it through them. Mostly after Bat-exposure of some sort. Those people just got weirder and weirder.

And not in a fun way, but Tim had... At least been happy.

Damien, on the other hand, had died the way he'd lived: a miserable little fucker with a height issue. After him and Dick and Bruce, Kon had stopped caring about the Bats.

"We figured you'd be able to handle him," Lex added, almost kind of complimentary. One day, maybe they'd all get along well enough that they could at least pass off as family in public.

Then again, maybe Kon was full of pipe dreams. "I have a place." Created using Kryptonian Phantom Zone technology, it had proven to be pretty effective over the years. Kal was a pretty good jailer, all things considered, and in combination with the crystal technology Krypton had used prior to their use of the Phantom Zone, it worked out okay.

"Awesome." Yeah, it was that, all right, even if that was one of the weird things about change. Nobody said that anymore. "Need any help?"

Kon was pretty sure that he and Lex sounded like they were living history reenactments some days, but. Words slipped in here and there, only they spent a lot of time together and it self-reinforced. "No, I can take it from here." Probably because Lex was standing there.

The hulking mass rose up, one of Lex's gadgets responsible for the easy movement, and Kon tilted his head. "You should come to dinner sometime. I even promise to keep Devilicus here away from the cake." Lex had cycled through half of the Warrior Angel lineup over the last couple of centuries. His current superhero name had made Kon laugh himself nearly sick, especially when Lex had insisted heatedly that Devilicus had merely been misunderstood.

Then again, life imitating art imitating life, or something like that.

There were comics about Devilicus again because of Lex, and that made him laugh and cringe and still pick them up through the stream and mutter about not storing paper copies. One day, Kon was waiting for Lex to tell someone to get off of his proverbial porch.

"Har har. But you should. We don't see much of you." Except when they called him for help.

It was sad in a lot of ways, especially when Kon realized how long it had been since he'd seen Clark behind the techfilter of Kal. "Maybe... maybe soon."

Maybe they'd do something nice for him in another ten or twenty years. Introduce him to somebody. Maybe somebody a little less mortal. Instead of being disappointed, Kon grinned. "Next week, then. I'll toss you a wave."

Kal nodded, and grabbed onto the edge of Lex's netting, and just took off. Vroom, faster than ever, way faster than a speeding bullet. Gone and quiet. Lex was still bitching about the lack of sonic boom from Kal. "So. The nanobots should be out soon to rebuild..."

"Guess that means we head home." They both stood watching after him for a long moment before Kon finally sighed. Destroying the cloning tech and all of the notes, it had been a good thing. The right thing, and Lois had agreed with it. Funny how doing something right felt completely horrible. He reached out and snagged Lex's hand. "C'mon. I wanna watch old movies and eat pizza." Never mind that it was hella easier to get chicken moo shi than it was to get a real proper pepperoni pizza these days.

The thing of it was.

It wasn't ever really gone. Not really. Not as long as Lex was alive. If he wanted to, he could. If Kon asked, Lex probably had a sample of her somewhere, but not her consciousness. That was so so long gone.

Lex flexed his fingers. "Let's reminisce over the 2200s."

Yeah. "That sounds like a plan." The best one, and if they ended up making out on the couch like a couple of kids, well.

There were worse ways to end a long day of crime fighting.


End file.
